The Open - Air Nursery School

37202

THE
OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

THE OPEN-AIR
NURSERY SCHOOL

BY

E. STEVINSON

SUPERINTENDENT OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN
OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

Author of "Handwork and Social History,"
" Pictures of Social Life "

1923

LONDON & TORONTO
J. M. DENT & SONS LTD.
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.

All nghh reurved

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN

IN MEMORIAL

RACHEL MCMILLAN

" The Works of the Just we m the Hand of God "

INTRODUCTION

THIS vivid book, like Mr. Alec Paterson's Across
the Bridges, makes the reader see things which he
ought to see, and know things which he ought to
know. It gives the human side, which had to be
portrayed too sparingly in Mr. Charles Booth's great
work on the life and labour of the people of London.
It is full of experience, insight and observation.
For us, living to-day, it has a plain message of
citizenship. For those who come after us it will
have the value of history. How much we should
learn from such a book, if Pestalozzi had had time
to write it, about the orphans whom he fed and
washed and taught at Stanz!

Miss Stevinson records the names of many of
the men and women who have helped forward the
attempt to deal with the fundamental needs of the
educational life of poor districts in this country.
The nation owes them more thanks and honour than
they are likely to get. But chief among those to
whom this gratitude and reverence are due stand
Rachel and Margaret McMillan. Their work has
been seminal. Both, though happily one of the two
is still actively at work, have given their lives for
the future of England. As years go on, the signifi-
cance of their work will become clear. They have
pointed the way and have been to others what

vii

viii INTRODUCTION

Matthew Arnold tells us his father was to him.
Compassion, courage, persistency, generous thrift,
and the thoughtful adjustment of means to ends are
the qualities called for by the finest kinds of social
reform. These the two sisters have practised.

A generation which has learnt to see the greatness
of William Blake will not fail to value what they have
done for us and for the children in their care.

MICHAEL E. SADLER.

OXFORD, November 1923.

CONTENTS

PART I

CHAP. PAGE

INTRODUCTION vu

I. THE CRY OF THE MOTHERS . i

II. MORE ABOUT OUR MOTHERS . 8

III. THE CHILDREN OF OUR SLUM AREAS . . 14

IV. GEORGIE 21

V. THE OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL ... 24

VI. A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A TODDLER 30

VII. THE THREE- AND FOUR- YEAR-OLDS ... 39

VIII. THE SEVEN-YEAR-OLDS 47

PART II

IX. THE BEGINNING OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN

NURSERY SCHOOL 53

X. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN

NURSERY SCHOOL 58

XI. OTHER OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOLS ... 62

PART HI

XII. THE NEED FOR THE NURSERY SCHOOL . . 66

XIII. THE STAFFING AND DOMESTIC ARRANGEMENTS OF

THE NURSERY SCHOOL .... 69

XIV. THE FRANCE OF THE NURSERY SCHOOL . . 73

PART IV

XV, THE PAST AND THE FUTURE 75

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Our FOR A FROUC Frontispiece

THE OPEN- AIR SCHOOL facing page 25

"A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM." The Mechanicals 51

THE
OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

PART I

CHAPTER I

THE CRY OF THE MOTHERS

It is not only in the rose,

It is not only in the bird,

Not only where the rainbow glows,

Nor m the song of woman heard;

But in the darkest, meanest things,

There always, always something sings.

EMERSON

IT is half-past eight on a Monday morning in mid-
October. The door of the Rachel McMillan Nursery
School has been open for the last hour, and many
little folk are trotting round the garden paths,
shouting merry greetings to one another. Bathing
operations are in full swing and the Nurse Teachers
are already very busy, for payments are taken and
new children admitted on the first day of the week.

To-day there are five vacant places. Three of our
five-year-old children have gone on to the elementary
schools in the district, and the parents of the remain-
ing two have left the neighbourhood. Sixty or more
names are on the waiting list, and five parents have
been asked to call and bring their children to see us.

Here comes Mrs, Baker. She is an old friend, a
stout, jolly woman with curly red hair. Her cap is
set well on the back of her head and she advances

2 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

with a rolling gait, arms akimbo. "WilTum/' her
small son, clutches at her voluminous skirts as he
trots beside her. She is followed by a little thin wisp
of a woman with anxious, frightened eyes.

'"Ere we are, Nurse!" calls Mrs. Baker. "'Ere's
Mrs. Tyler with *er Edith May. She lives agin me so
I brought 'er along. Show Nurse Edith May, old pal."

Mrs. Taylor is carrying her baby carefully wrapped
in a large shawl. She folds back one corner of the
wrap and discloses the small pale face of a little girl,
apparently about three years old. Glancing nervously
at the Superintendent:

"She can walk, Miss/' she says, hurriedly. "On'y
give 'er the back of a chair to 'old on to and she
can get along beautiful. She's a real strong child
is our Edith May tho' she mayn't look it. It's all
along of 'er 'avin' been tied to the table that's
made 'er weak on 'er pins." The little mite inside
the shawl sits up and protests, feebly crying. Her
mother hushes her tenderly. "She don't cry often,
Nurse. She's a real good child, but she ain't used
to folks/'

"Do you go out to work?" asks the Superin-
tendent, as she takes down particulars of the child's
age and address.

"Why, yes, Miss. There's on'y me to work. 'Er
father's dead. Mrs. Mason, me neighbour, she's
minded Edith May till now. But ever since the
kiddie got burned Mrs. Mason's nervous like, and
so whenever she's busy she takes and ties 'er up to
the table leg. 'Arf a crown a week I pay 'er to
keep Edith May. But it seems as if the babby
oughter be walkin' now, and, Miss, it'd be a god-
send if I could get 'er in 'ere, so it would/' And
the mother's anxious eyes follow the sturdy little
figures of our toddlers as they trot to and fro
along the garden paths.

THE CRY OF THE MOTHERS 3

" I'd like our Edith May to get a bit er colour in
'er cheeks and to run like them," she says wistfully.
" She don't know what a garden is, pore mite/'

Feebly protesting, little Edith May is carried to
the Toddlers' Shelter. The mother kisses her and
hurries away, waving her hand in farewell; and at
that moment Edith May doubtless longs for the
familiar table leg. But she is soon consoled, and
her anxious little mother, peeping round the corner
ten minutes later, sees her happily hugging a Teddy
bear and watching the nurse ladle hot porridge into
rows of waiting basins.

" 'Ere, Miss, is this the Creeche? "

"No, this is the Nursery School. We don't take
babies under two years old."

"Well, my Gertie's three. I've had 'er nime down
and a nurse called and told me to bring 'er to-day."
The speaker is a tall, slatternly girl, untidily dressed
in a tawdry green velvet blouse and black skirt. A
much-betrimmed hat is pinned to her unkempt hair.
Her restless roving black eyes and loose lips tell a
story that is not difficult to read.

"Is this Gertie?"

"Yes, this is my Gert. Come 'ere, you brat."
Roughly, but not unkindly, she pulls the child
forward.

"Do you go out to work? "

" 'Ow can I, with 'er to mind? But I want to."

"Does your husband work? "

"I ain't got no husband."

At this juncture Gertie peeps out from behind
her mother's skirts. She is a bonny child, with
bright blue eyes and curly hair. But all down
one side of her face runs an irregular disfiguring
scar, and when one speaks to her she bUnks
rapidly and shrinks away.

4 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

" How did she get that scar? "

The mother speaks sullenly. "It was this way.
I was out doin' a bit of shopping and Gertie she
took and fell on the fender and cut 'er bloomin'
little 'ed. Silly little fool she were! Me neighbour
were called in and she took Gert orf to the 'orspital
and when I come 'ome she were all stitched up. It
were a shime. She did 'oiler, didn't you, Gert? So
I out with their stitches meself, strite away. I
wouldn't 'ave it. Can you take 'er, Nurse?"

Yes, we will find room for Gertie.

" Nurse ! ' Ave you a place for our Sonny ? "

"Oh! Mrs. Thomas! Good morning! Of course
we'd like to have Sonny. Didn't you put his
name down?"

"Why, yes, Nurse, I believe I did. But you see
I mide a little mistike. It's 'is bufday to-day, and
I said as 'ow 'e wouldn't be two till next December.
Silly, now weren't I ? Got mixed up with me other
children. Must 'ave been because we 'ad such a
mild winter that I mide the mistike, I guess. But I
says to me 'usband before I come out, when I 'ad
er chance of er bit er work: 'Bill/ I says, *w'en
were our Sonny born? ' Bill 'e says, ' W'y, the same
day we bought our donkey for the barrer, and sure-
lee that was the 15th of October? Must a' been!
Disy/ he says 'e was allers one for a joke 'Disy,
you'll be forgettin' your own nime next. Do 'e
look like a babby of one year ten months, I ask yer ? ' "

"Well, Mrs. Thomas, you bring his birth certifi-
cate along, will you? "

"Oh, that there thing, Miss! Don't know what-
ever I done with it."

"You know, Mrs. Thomas, it isn't his turn yet.
I guess you'll find the certificate before that
comes round."

THE CRY OF THE MOTHERS 5

Poor Mrs. Thomas! She is such a kindly soul,
and ever ready to help her neighbours. But we
strongly suspect that she will not produce the
certificate yet awhile possibly not for two months.

And now there comes in at the gate a woman in
a very pitiful condition. Her long black skirt trails
on the ground, her boots bulge and gape, and her
eyes wander restlessly. She has the appearance of
a hunted creature.

"Are you the one we arsks about the bibies?
We've come about Be' trice. We goes out with
a barrel-organ and we've bin takin' 'er with
us, but the coppers made a row about it and
we daresent do it no more. Can you 'ave 'er,
Nurse ? " The woman pauses anxiously, then turns
to a man who has come in behind her leading
a child of about three years old: " Look, Jim;
look at the little blighters. Wouldn't you like
our Be' trice 'ere? She's orf to play with 'em.
Ain't she a corf-drop? Bless 'er 'art! Do you keep
the kids at night, Miss? We ain't got no 'ome, and
when we take the little 'un in with us to the boardin'
'ouse they are that insultin'. They can't abide kids.
We'll pay anything, Miss, if only you'll take 'er in.
Couldn't you manage just to find room for 'er? "
Be'trice came dancing up, shouting and laughing.
Who could resist her? As we walk together down
to the Babies' Shelter the mother continues : " She
ain't as clean as I could wish. I daresent take orf
her clothes at night in case they'd be pinched. So
I'll be real glad for 'er to 'ave a barf. But do be
careful of 'er, as she's terrible subject to the corf
and she ain't used to the water."

So the anxious woman goes off happily, and on
the way out she passes Mrs. O'Hara, one of our
jolliest mothers. Mrs. O'Hara bears down upon us
breezily, her baby in her arms, Johnnie running

6 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

behind hand in hand with a tiny white-faced boy
of four years old.

"Oh! Nurse, on Saturday I 'ad sech a time as
never was with this 'ere little baggage/' shaking the
baby lovingly. The baggage gurgles and fixes us
with big solemn blue eyes.

"The blessed creature swallered a safety-pin.
I turned 'er upside down, and I patted and I shook
the life near out of 'er to make 'er corf up that
pin, but she wouldn't. So I never stopped to get no
coat nor 'at. Orf I sets with the baby to the 'orspital
and tells the nurse that me baby 'as swallered a
safety-pin. The doctor got the thing to look at
her inside "

"X rays?" (inquiringly).

"Yes, them rays, and 'e turned 'em on 'er. I
waited all of a tremble. Doctor, 'e comes to me and
says, 'Mother,' 'e says, "Ere's your baby and the
safety-pin tight in 'er 'and all the time.' "

"Ah! Miss, I could 'ave shook the biby, bless 'er,
all to bits. Look at 'er now. She's winkin' ! " Sure
enough, the baby, in her efforts to get one pink fist
crammed into her mouth, was solemnly closing one
eye at us.

"But, Nurse, I'm forgettin' what I come for.
'Ere's 'Erbert Green. He's consumptive, and Mrs.
Green's my neighbour. She's 'ad ten and buried
eight, she 'as. The baby lies a-bed with 'er now and
'ere's 'Erbert left. She sees my Johnnie a-bustin*
out of 'is clothes and too proud to sit down to his
meals without a tablecloth, and that 'appy and all,
and she's set 'er 'art on 'er 'aving 'er 'Erbert 'ere.
The doctor at the school says *e oughter be in
the open air. Can you tike 'im, Miss? "

Poor little pale-faced Herbert looks about him
wistfully. Big Johnnie, protecting, shows him the
beauties of the garden. We decide that Herbert

THE CRY OF THE MOTHERS ?

shall come to-morrow and see our own doctor, and
if she agrees that it is right for him to be with the
other children we will take him. So off Johnnie
runs to his own shelter and Mrs. O'Hara takes
Herbert's hand. "Can't eat anything, Nurse, not
even a bit of fish and chips," says she mournfully.
"All skin and bone 'e is"; and as they go outside
the gate it is borne in upon us within that unless
we find a place for little Herbert quickly, he will
not be here to take it when it is found.

More mothers stream through the gate. More
names ace entered in the book.

Is there no need for Nursery Schools in our slum
areas? Would that the unconvinced could then
suggest some way to solve our mothers' problems!

CHAPTER II

MORE ABOUT OUR MOTHERS

These things I, seizing you by the shoulders, will shake you
fall you understand them! For a certainty you are not greater
nor less than me. I neither look upon you with envy nor with
pity, with deference nor with contempt. Endowments and
accomplishments are of no account whatever, but honesty
and to stand in time under the great law of Equality after
which you will be satisfied and joy will take possession of you.

CARPENTER.

Two questions are put to us, as teachers in the
Nursery School, more often than I can say. The
first is : "Are you not taking away the responsibility
of the mothers when you build Nursery Schools and
tend their children for them?" The second: "Is
not the home the proper and orthodox place in which
to bring up the young children?"

Our answer to the second question is short and to
the point : " Go and visit ten or twelve typical slum
homes and then continue to say, if you dare, that
they are fit and proper places in which to bring up
God's children." In answer to the first question,
we would definitely state that it is not our inten-
tion to take away the responsibility of the mother.
Our aim is rather to awaken her to a sense of her
own great responsibility. We try to educate the
mother with the child, and when we take the child
we accept also a certain amount of responsibility
for the mother.

Almost all our mothers love their children. The
trouble is that some love them so unwisely. They
can deny them nothing, and this loving unwisdom
is the root-cause of most of our difficulties.

8

MORE ABOUT OUR MOTHERS 9

Take the case of Mrs. Brown. She is a gentle,
brave little woman who spends almost half her
time in hospital fighting tuberculosis. She is very
proud of her two children. What wonder? She
has lost eight little ones within the last twelve years.

Alexander, the elder of the two children, is a
great favourite in the Nursery School. He has a
violent temper, but when he is in one of his charming
moods he wins all hearts. "When he is good he is
very good indeed, but when he is bad he is horrid."
He is not beautiful. He has rather a stunted figure
with a bullet head and a raucous voice. To an out-
sider he might even, appear unattractive, but one
and all his teachers fall victims to his charms. He
disciplines them well. They know that when they
stand up to Alexander they are in for a bad time,
for rumour hath it that once, when seriously
annoyed, he wailed on end for two hours. But
when he is really interested Alexander is a delight-
ful person to teach, for he becomes utterly absorbed
in what he is doing. His whole expression changes
and he learns with lightning rapidity.

Alexander has his mother well in hand he
cuddles her and she is his slave. Watch her on
the way to the Nursery one hot July morning. Her
cough is troublesome and she carries wee, auburn-
haired Kitty in her arms while Alexander, aged
three, trudges at her side. The children have had
no breakfast save a sip of mother's tea for porridge
and milk will be served to them at school. They
have to pass the sweetstuff shop at the corner,
where trays of unwholesome sweets are laid out
pink, yellow, brown and black sweets jujubes,
"hundreds and thousands," sugar-sticks and sher-
bert The flies are very active this morning swarming
over the sticky trays, while here and there a wasp
bumps drowsily against the dirty window-pane.

io OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

Alexander is fascinated! He tugs at his mother's
skirts and points at the highly -coloured dainties.
She feebly resists. "You'll have nice porridge
directly, my duck," she tells him. Alexander opens
his mouth and wails; then he roars, and finally he
stamps and screams. Is it any wonder that his
mother sometimes gives in? She is utterly weary;
she loves him and hates to see him cry. And so it
often turns out that Alexander comes forth from the
shop triumphant, to enjoy all that the flies have
left of a bright pink sugar-stick. His mother knows
that the poisonous colouring matter and cheap
sugar are bad for him especially as he has had no
breakfast as yet. Sores constantly break out on
his face and ears, and he has no appetite for whole-
some food. But he smiles upon her and trots happily
by her side, and all is sunshine in their little world.

What are we going to do about it ? Well, we take
away the sweets if the children bring them into the
Nursery School, and we know that from eight o'clock
in the morning till half-past five at night no un-
wholesome food is consumed. Then we talk to the
mothers in the mornings, in the evenings, and at
the club, and the school doctor talks to them when
she examines the children. We find that the horrid
little wisps of newspaper do not appear so frequently
within the gates as the children get accustomed to
plain food and the discipline of the Nursery School.
If the mother declines to listen to us and the child
suffers from sores in consequence, we have to ex-
clude him and tell the mother to take him daily
to the Clinic until he is cured.

It is very difficult to make our mothers realise
the dangers of infection. Little Lily Jacobs came
to school one day with red and inflamed eyes.
Obviously she was suffering from conjunctivitis.
The teacher went home with Lily and asked the

MORE ABOUT OUR MOTHERS n

mother to take her regularly to the Clinic and
have her eyes bathed then she would soon be
well and able to come back to school.

" Bless you, Miss/' cried Mrs. Jacobs, arms akimbo,
"that ain't conjunctivitis! That's the draughts in
the 'ouse. Every door and winder in the place
rattles like mad fit to drive yer crazy. That's
what's the matter with my Lily! Conjunctivitis?
Not it, Miss! Why, look at our Georgie, he's got
sore eyes. Look at me, ain't I got 'em? Look at
our Bill! We're all the same, Miss, every one of us,
and don't that prove it's the winders? "

Alas! Mrs. Jacobs must be registered as one of
our failures. We could not prevail. If Lily might
not attend school to-day she should never come
again. "The draughts done it." We must not
doubt her word, and so we lost Lily. There are still
Mrs. Jacobses amongst the ranks of our mothers
but not so many as there were last year.

Mrs. Roberts is a thin, delicate girl of eighteen
an over-anxious mother. Her little two year old
Ronnie has had delicate lungs from birth. Mrs.
Roberts is a widow. She goes out to work daily,
and Ronnie is the joy of her life. " Nurse, if I can't
keep 'im out of the 'orspital I'll go mad," she says.
"I must 'ave 'im to come 'ome to at nights."

One bitterly cold January morning little Mrs.
Roberts trailed into the Nursery, wan -eyed and
sorrowful. Ronnie lay in her arms white and
exhausted, breathing heavily. The Nurse gently
took him from her.

"'E seemed so ill last night, Nurse," she said,
"sneezing and coughing, that I shut up the winders
and doors and stopped all the cracks. I lighted a
fire and put 'im in bed with all 'is clothes a-top of
'im. It was so 'ot I could 'ardly bear. I 'ad to sit
outside meself . But I thought, poor lamb, if I made

12 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

'im real 'ot at night 'e perhaps would not take such
cold when 'e come out in the morning. Now 'e
catches 'is breath like, and I'm frightened for *im."

Little Ronnie did not die. Perhaps his mother's
need of him was too great. She gave up her work
and nursed him through a severe attack of pneu-
monia, helped and advised by Nursery School
teacher and district nurse.

Grandmother Ruffle brought her two little grand-
children to the Nursery one hot morning in August
Victoria, aged two, and Maudie aged four. It was
the hour for bathing, and operations were in full
swing in the Toddlers' Shelter. Grandmother stood
by the shelter, scratching her ear thoughtfully. At
length she spoke. "Miss," quoth she, "these 'ere
children are orphans they ain't got no father nor
mother neither. You wouldn't go for to bath them,
Miss, now would yer? It wouldn't be right/'

"Oh, but, Mrs. Ruffle, 71 said the nurse in charge,
"we always bath our babies. They love it. Look
at them!"

"Ah, Miss," was grandmother's sage reply. "We
often like what's bad for us and does us 'arm. Our
Victoria '11 catch 'er death of cold if you try it on
with 'er. I don't 'old with newfangled ways
meself." But she left the children in our care.
We bathed them and they are still alive indeed,
they flourish.

Many of our mothers put too many clothes on
their children. It is hard to make them realise how
unhealthy it is to wrap up the little bodies in such
warm and heavy clothing.

One little boy came to us who suffered from a
weak chest. We found that he was wrapped round
and round in layers of newspaper soaked in cam-
phorated oil. How long this padding had enveloped
his poor little body I should not like to say.

MORE ABOUT OUR MOTHERS 13

Some of the children are dressed much more
warmly on Monday than on Thursday. The shadow
of the pawnshop looms darkly and heavily over the
Nursery School. Boots are often requisitioned on
Wednesday, and the poor little owners see them no
more until after pay-day (Friday).

Most of our mothers are Peter Pans. What chance
have they to grow up? Before their school-days
are over they are put in charge of the babies
of the family. When they leave school they go
out to work, and at an early age they marry and
have children of their own. After that life is one
ceaseless round of work and worry. There is no time
to clean the house, no time to sew, and, above all,
no time to think. There is only time to earn money
and buy food to satisfy the little clamouring mouths.

They wander into the gardens our mothers
in the grey of winter mornings, pulling their shawls
around their shoulders, coughing and talking to
the children in shrill voices. Tenderly they bid the
little ones farewell, and then back they trudge to
the wash-tub or the factory. In the evening, when
the day's work is done, we see them once more.
Their arms are hungry for their wee ones and their
faces are alight with love.

They are very wonderful and very lovable. They
can endure lif e has taught them that lesson. Their
patience is almost terrible. But they find it very
difficult to make any effort, for they are always
tired. And so it is uphill work for them and for us.

CHAPTER III

THE CHILDREN OF OUR SLUM AREAS

Here is Thy footstool, and here rest Thy feet where live the
poorest, the lowliest and the lost.

When I bow to Thee my obeisance cannot reach down to the
depth where Thy feet rest amongst the poorest, the lowliest
and the lost. RABINDRANATH TAGORE,

THE children of our slum areas suffer terribly to-day
from overcrowding and bad conditions. The open
spaces and parks are usually too difficult of access
for the wee ones the gutters and mean streets
must be their playgrounds. The gutter is a thrilling
spot, full of surprises and fraught with much in-
terest, but it does not make a very safe or hygienic
playground for a baby girl or boy.

When it so happens that the mother of the family
must go out to work she is faced with this question:
What shall she do with those of her little ones
under school age? She must lock her house door,
or her property may be stolen. Shall the children
be left inside or outside that closed door? A friendly
neighbour will probably promise to keep an eye on
little Maggie or Tom, but still the problem has
to be faced.

Suppose the little ones are locked inside, there
is always the danger of an accident, especially in
winter time with the fire alight. Last December
one of the teachers from the Rachel McMillan
Nursery School called at a house near by, to tell
the mother we had now room to take her baby.
The little one's name had been on the waiting-list
for weeks. The door of the house stood open and,

CHILDREN OF OUR SLUM AREAS 15

unable to attract anyone's attention, the teacher
stepped inside. She found herself in a spotlessly
clean room almost bereft of furniture. But there
on a little table in the centre was a coffin, and
inside lay a little waxen form, the smiling baby
face pillowed in flowers.

* The mother came forward from the back of
the room.

" I left 'er 'ere, Nurse, last Toosday with our Rose
Mary, just 'arf a mo 1 while I ran round to borrer a
cupful of flour from Mrs. Brown. Our Rose Mary's
five year old, so she oughter know 'ow to mind a
biby by now. But when I come back with me flour
in me 'and me sweet lamb was all of a blaze, and
our Rose Mary was screaming 'er 'art out. There
weren't no savin' 'er. And, Miss, I'd often pictured
'er as I passed by the Baby Camp, a-playin' with
them red engines, a-draggin' them round the
path. It do seem 'ard."

" How beautiful she looks, and what lovely
flowers!"

" I 'adn't any money, Nurse, to buy flowers for
'er. So I charges a penny for folks to come and see
the corpse, and that's 'ow I got me flowers; I've
made a tidy bit. Them lilies cost a lot."

Is it worse to run these terrible risks inside,
or to brave the dangers of the gutter and the
traffic without?

Suppose we visit another home. Would that we
could take with us some of the people who deem
Nursery Schools an unnecessary luxury! But they
will certainly not come with us, so we will go and
see Mrs. Harding alone. Johnnie did not come to
school yesterday; we will find out what is the
matter with him.

The door of the house where Mrs. Harding lives
stands wide open. The passage, with its oak

16 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

panelling, is very dark, for this is one of the fine old
Elizabethan houses still standing in Deptford. Up
the winding dirty staircase, with its carved banisters,
we tread to the top of the house. Groping carefully,
we knock at a certain door.
"Come in!"

How shall we get across that room to the bed
where Johnnie lies, with mother standing beside
him? It is an enormous four-poster, and Johnnie
sleeps there nightly with father, mother and Davy.
Johnnie sleeps across the foot. Baby rests in the
"pram" beside the bed, and Mary in a stretcher
between the big bed and the door. There is " a nice
bit of fire 11 in the grate. The coal is kept in a
bulging cardboard box "close 'andy." Tea, sugar,
bread and margarine are on the mantel-piece,
together with the remains of a fried-fish supper.
The window-pane has been broken, and the hole
stuffed with all sorts of garments. The draught
caused by the opening of the door causes the sleeve
of father's shirt to fly out and flap threateningly
at us. A large can of water and a bowl stand by
the window.

Advancing cautiously across the floor, we are
smitten on the head with something cold and
clammy.

"'Old *ard, Nurse. I done a bit *er washin'
to-day," cries our hostess. We look up. Strings
are fastened across and across the walls lines of
strings. The damp garments hang nearest the fire
the family wardrobe hangs over the bed.

" I'm keepin' Johnnie warm, Nurse. I was afraid
yesterday *e was going to sicken for the scarlet.
But I tied this 'ere bloater round 'is neck just to
ease J im, like. 'E's much better now. Will you
look at 'im, Miss, as you are 'ere? "
Yes, we will, Mrs. Harding, if we can get to the

CHILDREN OF OUR SLUM AREAS 17

bed. Stepping over the coal-box, winding our way
round the head of Mary's stretcher, catching our
ankles on the wheels of baby's pram and nearly
overturning the water-can we arrive at last by
the bedside and examine Johnnie. We suggest
the removal of the bloater, and after some argu-
ment this is done. We make and suggest plans
for the comfort of Johnnie. Mrs. Harding listens
indulgently. "You'd think twice about washin*
'im, Nurse, if you'd to fetch every mite o j water
from the scullery, and if you'd to 'eat it up in a
kettle what leaks/*

Yes, Mrs. Harding, I guess we should!

"And that there Mrs. Smith, what lives in the
room where the tap is, she's that contrary, and
'olds on to the tap so you'd think she was the
Deptford Water Works itself! But there, miss,
I'll wash 'im for yer."

Of course our children come from many types
of home. Mrs. Roberts owns a small shop in the
neighbourhood. Her children are beautifully tended
and her house is spotlessly clean. She sends her
children to our Nursery School, and helps us enor-
mously by her loyalty and by the good example
she sets the other mothers.

Mrs. Wilmot has three rooms right at the top
of Frobisher's Buildings, up six flights of stairs.
She has only two children, Melia and Bella. One
day she came to the Nursery School dressed in
highly respectable black. The black "bugles" in
her bonnet nodded respectability, and respectability
waved triumphant from the coloured handker-
chiefs pinned cornerwise with safety-pins upon the
narrow chests of Melia and Bella.

Mrs. Wilmot regarded the Superintendent severely.

" Yes, I was thinking about 'em coming to school,
Miss/* she said, "though I don't 'old with schools.

i8 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

I don't want to send 'em, but I'm forced, because
I'm going into 'orspital meself to-morrow. I'm
not a lady as mixes up with me neighbours, and
Bella and Melia they've kept theirselves to their-
selves ever since they was born. I don't 'old with
children playing in the streets, and its always been
my dooty to keep my children respectable. Penny
for life and penny for death I've insured 'em.

" Of a morning, after I've washed 'em, I set Melia
in one chair and Bella in another, and I've learnt
'em to sit quite still and not get theirselves messed
up. They are good children, Miss, though I says it.
Never say a word, and where you put 'em, there
they'll set.'*

Two little puffy white faces, two little snubby
noses, two little soft mouths hanging open, and
two pairs of great grey wistful eyes. With silky
hair beautifully kept, in neatly mended cotton
frocks, Melia and Bella stood confessed one on each
side of mother.

"Adenoids!" The thought flashed across the
mind of the Superintendent, but never a word she
said, lest Bella and Melia be snatched from her in
horror. She took the little girls by the hands
such cold flabby hands! and they bid farewell
to mother.

Melia and Bella were nearly five, although they
looked but three years old. Miss Pitts, to whose
shelter they were taken, took charge of them.
She found them little chairs, gave them picture
books and toys, and tried to make them talk, but
though Bella and Melia would nod and shake their
heads, they would not speak. At dinner-time if fed
they would eat, but when left alone they gazed
vacantly round at the other children.

"Aren't they pretty, Nursie!'* cried sturd)
Tommy, admiringly, "but can't they talk? **

CHILDREN OF OUR SLUM AREAS 19

Tommy dived down into the depths of a grubby
pocket and produced a great treasure a cigar-
ette card. " Here! " He put it into Melia's hand.
It fell on the floor the little fingers did not
close round it. Disgusted, Tommy ran off, more
interesting fish to fry.

" Where you put 'em, there they'll set."

We were able to get a "medical" on Melia and
Bella. The doctor reported that they were suffer-
ing from general debility and unfit for the ele-
mentary school. They are improving wonderfully.
They shout and race and dance now with the
merriest of children.

The dirt with which we have to contend with in
the slums is deplorable. The overworked mother is
often far too tired to heat water to bathe her child
at the end of a long day. Still less is she likely to
wash the bedclothes often enough to keep the bed
in a sanitary condition and free from vermin.

Cleansing stations have been established in
different parts of our great cities, and verminous
children as a last resort are sent thither to be
cleansed ! To be cleansed ? When ? And how often ?
This cleansing is deeply resented by the very people
the authorities are trying to help. It is considered
a punishment and a disgrace. If Nursery Schools
were to spring up throughout the country many,
if not all, these cleansing stations could be closed.

These methods of desperation would become un-
necessary if we could claim for the children of the
poor even a small portion of the nurture and
education deemed necessary for the children of
the well-to-do.

Impetigo is in its origin the direct result of dirt.
Many evils are the result of dirt. Running ears
trouble us. They are sometimes the result of
debility after an attack of scarlet fever or measles;

20 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

but they, like many other evils, often in their origin
are due to dirt. Sore eyes axe very painful, and
if neglected they become dangerous. They must
also be numbered amongst our common afflictions.

The doctor tells us that eighty per cent, of the
children we admit suffer from rickets. Tuberculosis
is a scourge. And it should be remembered that all
these diseases are preventable; the sun heals many
of our rickety children in three months.

CHAPTER IV

GEORGIE

HE came strolling in at the gate one morning in
September, a quaint little figure, his nether parts
attired in very ragged trousers, his curly head
enveloped in an enormous cap. He trotted along
the garden path, clambered down the wooden
staircase, walked in at the Junior Shelter, and sat
down at one of the breakfast tables. Here he was
discovered by Miss Hum.

"What is your name, little man? '* she asked.

He smiled a bewitching smile.

" Georgie 'Olland," he told her.

" Where do you live, Georgie? "

" In there! M Georgie pointed with a grubby fore-
finger to the interior of the shelter.

"Where's your mummie?" she asked.

Georgie smiled still more sweetly and pointed the
same grubby forefinger straight at her. Her heart
was won.

Bewildered and much intrigued by Georgie, the
teachers held a consultation. Together they ques-
tioned the young man, but nothing further could
they learn of his home or his parents. Inquiries
were made of the mothers and of the men standing
outside the gates. Georgie's home and parentage
still remained a mystery.

At last the Superintendent sought the aid of the
jolly policeman at the corner. He had often helped
her before in distressful times.

"Why, yes, I'll take the little chap to the police

21

22 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

station/' quoth he. "That's where they'll come to
find him."

It seemed hard to tear Georgie away from his new-
found friends, and we compromised with the officer.
He agreed to report Georgie at the police station,
and to leave the little chap with us until after he
had his dinner.

Meanwhile Georgie was enjoying himself; but he
refused to be parted from his large cap or from
his "mum" as he tested the resources of the
Nursery School.

Dinner-time came. The older children gathered
round "the little lost boy" and clamoured to be
allowed to sit beside him. But great was their
horror when they found that he used his fingers
instead of his spoon to convey fish and potatoes
to his mouth! And sore was the indignation of
little Miss Julia Peacock, his neighbour, when,
having safely disposed of his own repast, Georgie
incontinently grabbed hers and demolished that!
Miss Julia doubtless felt that she paid dearly for
the honour of sitting beside the hero of the occasion.
One o'clock brought our friend the officer. So
friendly, big and jolly he appeared that Georgie
left us without a murmur, waving his hand and
shouting cheerfully:

" Comin' back to-morrow, Mum an' all! "
During the course of the afternoon the policeman
returned to tell us that on his way to the police
station he met one of Georgie's cousins, and this
lad was able to direct him to the child's home.

"His dad's very grateful to you for keeping him,"
said the officer, " and he's coming down to Camp to
see you to-night."

About half-past five Georgie's father came in a
tall man with a slightly bent figure and dark, kind
eyes which reminded one of the child.

GEORGIE 23

" I want to thank you aU for being so kind to the
little chap," he said. "He's got no mother she
died when he were just over a year old. It's been a
hard fight for me with four lads to bring up, and the
eldest a cripple an' all. I looked after the little 'Tin
meself till I got work, and since then the cripple
lad 'as had him. 'E's a good lad, my Bob, but
some days the pain's so bad that he can't get out,
and then the little 'un 'as to stop inside too. He's
a rare one for the streets, but I daresent let him
out alone and him just turned three, so I says to
him that I'll bring 'im round to the Nursery School.
Ever 1 since then 'e's been at me. 'Take me to the
Camp, Dad,' says 'e of a mornin'. I put him off
two or three days, because I was late and I didn't
just know how to get 'im in. Tisn't as if he had a
mother. Well, Miss, you must know yourself how
easy it is to put things orf. So you see, Miss,
when I was out he took 'isself to school. That's
'ow it was. And if you'll kindly keep 'im I'll
bring 'im reg'lar."

So Georgie began his school-days.

Promptly at a quarter-past eight he trots in at
the gate, the cripple brother limping painfully
behind him. Gaily he greets his "mum" and his
playmates, and cheerfully he smiles upon us all.

His chestnut curls are brushed and shining now
he has discarded the disfiguring cap, his garments
are neat, and he looks very bonny clad in a brightly-
coloured overall. He wields his spoon demurely,
and is learning to respect his neighbour's pudding.
Georgie the motherless sought the Nursery School.
His need of it was great. There are many Georgies
to-day. But where are the Nursery Schools which
should prove their haven of refuge?

CHAPTER V

THE OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

The flowers are happy in the garden,
For the bees are always there;
The clouds are happy up in Heaven
With angels m the air;
But little boy and little mouse
Are rather lonely in the house

LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA.

THE Open-Air Nursery School is a garden, round
the walls of which are built long, low shelters. The
garden belongs to the children, and in planning it
we must sweep away all our own grown-up, pre-
conceived ideas. Away with cabbages, onions and
carrots! Let us have beautiful grassy lawns upon
which we may run, and concrete for use in
wet weather. When scores of pairs of stout little
legs need exercise, we must make use of all our
available space.

The garden must be an interesting place. There
must be little paths that wind in and out of the
flower-beds, and steps for adventurers to climb.
Ribstalls should be fastened to the garden walls,
and balancing boards provided.

We must have trees and a brave show of flowers
Michaelmas daisies, chrysanthemums, daffodils
and tulips, roses and geraniums. The children from
our drab dark streets rejoice in the flowers just as
they love their gaily-coloured overalls and ribbons.

Then we must not forget the herb garden, so
unparalleled for the sense training. Our little
Toddlers trot round the paths hand in hand, smelling

24

OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL 25

one flower and examining another, and we can
almost hear one of them say as his little curly head
bends over the swelling buds these sunny mornings
in February:

Little brown houses and what do you hold?
Treasures of purple and crimson and gold >
Kings, queens and princesses wear robes like these,
Tell us who lives in you, brown houses, please!

We must think of our pets too, and make pro-
vision for them. Which is the sunniest place for
our aviary? Where shall the pigeon-house stand?
Where shall we put the rabbits and the hens? For
it is of no use to provide pets for the children if
they cannot be kept happy and in a healthy con-
dition, and it is never too soon to awaken in the
children a sense of their responsibility for the
lower creation. 1

Each Shelter should be very simply furnished,
and should accommodate a group of thirty-five to
fifty children. " Necessities, but no luxuries," must
be our motto in the Nursery School to-day, while
the economy axe still hangs threateningly over our
heads, and misery and want are at our gates.

We need no luxuries. We must have tables and
chairs and beds, plenty of blackboard space, and
plenty of cupboard room. Cupboards are necessary,
for beds, blankets, chairs and tables must all be
packed away at night in an Open- Air School.

Every Shelter should have its own bathroom, and
there must be an abundance of hot water. The
Toddlers' bathroom should be provided with several
pot-baths fitted with hot and cold water taps, and
raised from the ground for the convenience of the
Staff. There should be a separate sink for washing
purposes. Pegs should be fixed to the walls, upon

1 For a fuller description of a Nursery School Garden, see Th$
Nursery School, by Margaret McMillan,,

26 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

which the children's towels and flannels can be
hung, and racks must be provided for the many
toothbrushes. Needless to say, all the children's
property must be carefully marked.

The bathroom for the older children should have
little wash-hand basins for the three-year-old has
arrived at the dignity of "washing mine own self."
There should be a large tiled bath here roomy
enough to accommodate three or four children at
one time, and provided with a hot and cold spray.
It is a great joy to the children to play in the bath
together, and the water is kept running all the time,
so that there is no risk of infection.

The door of the Rachel McMillan Nursery School
is opened at half-past seven in the morning, and
remains open until half-past five. Some of the
mothers must be at work by eight o'clock, and they
are glad to leave their babies with us on their way
to the factory. The majority of children come in
between eight and nine. We are often asked by
visitors, " Is not this a very inconvenient arrange-
ment ? Would it not be better to have a fixed time
for the children to assemble? " As a matter of fact,
the present arrangement suits us well for it makes
it more possible for the Heads of the Departments to
examine each child upon arrival. Visitors also ask
us whether we tell the mothers not to trouble to
bathe their children. On the contrary, we expect
the mothers to help us in every way they can, and it
is noticeable that after we have had the children
for some time the mothers begin to take much
more pride in their personal appearance.

After a little one has been greeted and examined
by the Head of the Department, he passes on to
the bathroom. Perhaps he is to enjoy a good splash
in the white-tiled bath; perhaps he only needs to
wash his face and hands in one of the low basins

OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL 27

He is provided with flannel, towel and toothbrush.
They hang on his own peg, and he knows where
to find them and how to hang them up again when
he has finished with them. Attention to hair, teeth
and nails follows.

Dinner is always a serious affair. All the children
above three years of age learn to help themselves
from the little serving dish passed round by the
"monitor." We instituted this practice in order to
try and teach them not to be greedy, but to take
just as much food as they require. Of course the
Nurse Teachers, who are superintending the meal,
watch carefully to see that each little one takes
enough, and it is astonishing to find how their
appetites improve after a few weeks of plain, good
food and open-air life.

When dinner is over, the bigger children are proud
to help clear away the dinner plates and dishes, roll
up the tablecloths, sweep the floor and put out the
beds. Then each little person is rolled up in a big
warm blanket and popped down in his camp-bed.

Every child in the Nursery School is expected to
sleep, or at least to rest, after dinner. Occasionally
the mothers ask us if their children may be excused
the sleep, but we make no exception to this rule,
and they soon find that the mid-day nap does not
interfere with the children's rest at nights.

The two-year-old will sometimes sleep soundly for
two hours the three-year-old for an hour or an
hour and a half. Some of the "fours" or just turned
"fives" do not sleep, but they are trained to lie
quietly for at least three-quarters of an hour. Only
under very exceptional circumstances do we wake
our children from the mid-day sleep, and it is not
uncommon on a Monday to find one or two Toddlers
still sleeping soundly at half-past three, despite the
hubbub going on around them.

28 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

Monday morning! Careless and weary mothers
new mothers sometimes come late to the Nursery
School carrying fretful, wailing babies. The little
ones have missed their regular food, and their
digestions are upset; they have missed their mid-
day sleep and their nerves are out of order. Sore
eyes and ears have been neglected, and heads are
not always clean.

Black Monday indeed! But happily the babies
usually sleep soundly when once they are tucked
up, and by Tuesday morning the effects of the
week-end have worn off.

Of course this is not the case with "old" and
careful mothers. They take a pride in presenting
their babies clean and in good health on the first
day of the week.

The children themselves learn to take the mid-day
sleep as a matter of course. I remember one little
boy he was three years old stumbling into the
Camp one Monday morning, lying flat down on
the shelter floor, and falling immediately into a
deep sleep. He was picked up, rolled in his blanket
and put to bed, and there he slept until dinner-
time. We who knew his home conditions were not
surprised. Father, mother and six children slept in
one little low-ceilinged room.

One Saturday morning we were eating our twelve
o'clock lunch in the open-air dining-room, which
looks out on the garden. The Camp door stood
open, and we suddenly espied a small Toddler trot-
ting down the path in a purposeful fashion. Straight
down the garden she trotted, merely pausing to pass
the time of day with Bagheera, the Camp cat, who
paused in her washing operations, scandalised at
the intrusion on a Saturday morning. Our Toddler
made for the little grass plot under the mulberry
tree, and, having taken her bearings, curled herself

OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL 29

up in a little ball and fell fast asleep. She only lived
next door as it happened, so having seen that she
was warm and comfortable we left her to have her
sleep out.

Sometimes when students come to us to train
they feel that they will dislike the " sleeping shift "
that it will be dull work. Not at all! The experi-
enced Nursery School Teacher gets to know her
charges very well at "sleeping time." She learns a
great deal about the treatment the children receive
at home about their only half-realised fears. She
is on very intimate terms with her babies when
they are dropping off to sleep.

All teachers are not successful with the sleeping
shift. It is not easy until regular habits are formed
to induce fifty children to go to sleep in the middle
of the day even if they are tired. The noisy
teacher who runs about distractedly crying " Hush ! "
is of no use at all; the fussy teacher is of no use;
the teacher who alternately threatens and cajoles
is worse than useless.

It is quite an art, this management of the sleeping
shift, and some otherwise good teachers are not
successful. I cannot explain it. I only know that
the teachers who are successful have usually strong
and restful personalities. They know that this
need must be met.

Oh, listen! Bells of dreamland are ringing soft and low I
What a pleasant, pleasant country it is to which we go,
And little nodding travellers are seen in every spot.
All riding off to dreamland trot trot trot.

CHAPTER VI

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A TODDLER

A dreary place would this earth be
Were there no little people in it;

The song of Me would lose its mirth
Were there no children to begin it.

WHITTIER.

KITTY IVY is "two years old and a bit." She is a
small stout personage, very determined, one might
almost say pugilistic, by nature.

One glorious morning in October a jolly young
student coining on duty at a quarter-past eight
"pick-a-backs" Kitty Ivy, and races round the
garden with her for the sheer joy of being alive.
Daisy, the kid, tethered beneath the mulberry tree,
sniffs the air, tosses her horns, and leaps sideways
three times to show her appreciation of the weather.
Algernon, our one and only cock, struts round his
domain. He tries to look dignified, as in the happy
days before his tail feathers played him false, but
alas! it takes fine feathers to make fine birds, and
his wives will have none of it. They cluck derisively.

"Good-bye, Kitty Ivy!" cries jolly Elna, and
she pops the Toddler over the rails into the Open-
Air Shelter. The Toddlers' Shelter is a long, low
building. One of the gas-fires is alight, and in the
red glow the room looks cheerful and inviting.
Gaily-coloured overalls, fresh from the wash-tub,
are hanging over the high guards ready for use,
and from the adjoining bathroom comes a cheerful
hum of voices. " Good-morning, Kitty Ivy/' says

30

THE LIFE OF A TODDLER 31

the Head of the Department, lifting that small
person up to sit on the table and looking at her very
carefully. She examines head, eyes, ears and skin,
while Kitty Ivy chats away to her. Cheerful voices
in the bathroom chant:

'Twas on a Sunday morning that I beheld my darling,
She looked so sweet and charming in every kind of way,
She looked so sweet and charming

" 'Taimin' Want a barf, 1 ' says Kitty Ivy,

wriggling off the table.

"Away then, Kitty Ivy!' 1 and the mite dances
into the bathroom.

Kitty Ivy wears many clothes. The student who
picks her up protesting and proceeds to divest her
of her garments is sadly aware of the fact. First
a thick red stuff petticoat, then a grey knitted one,
then a flannelette one, then a queer stiff thing that
wraps Kitty's little body round and round many
times. "Me stays!" says Kitty proudly. "And I've
got Vi'let May's shift on, and Vi'let May's got
Mummie's."

Kitty Ivy loves the water. She tries to turn on
the tap when Nurse is not looking. She loves the
thrill of pulling out the plug and putting her small
pink toe into the cavity. She loves to play with the
soap bubbles, and she loves it most of all when
Jemina, the celluloid duck, swims proudly across
the soapy torrent.

The trend of the song is now, "Rub-a-dub-dub,
three men in a tub!" Kitty Ivy is standing on a
table, her little body all aglow as her "Nursie" rubs
her down with a warm towel. The bathroom is now
full. Small boys and girls are in various stages of
undressing, dressing, bathing and brushing "teef."

Kitty Ivy has washed her own teeth with much
spluttering, and " Nursie " has cut her nails and

32 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

brushed her scanty locks. Her multitudinous petti-
coats swathe her once more.

The grey-eyed student surveys Kitty Ivy seriously
as she holds up a blue overall embroidered with
brown. "Will you have this one, Kitty Ivy?"
she asks.

" No ! " says that young person decidedlv. " Want
red 'un."

So the red overall is popped over Kitty Ivy's
determined head.

"Ribbing!" demands Kitty Ivy.

The grave young student regards her scanty locks
with dismay.

"Kitty Ivy shall have her hair brushed like the
boys," she says soothingly.

"Ribbing! Ribbing! Ribbing!" wails Kitty Ivy
crescendo. "Kitty Ivy does have ribbing tie."

It is a difficult task, but Kitty's nurse is a per-
severing young person. Kitty Ivy sits very still,
lips tightly pressed, eyes rather threatening. Nursie,
red with excitement, manages to collect a tuft of
hair and secure it triumphantly with a large red
ribbon bow.

"Brekfus," says Kitty Ivy, and off she trots to
the shelter. Numbers of little folk, with eager,
expectant faces, are struggling with diminutive
arm -chairs. Each Toddler insinuates his small
person into the chair, and then with or without
help of "Nursie" the chair is pushed under the table.

A steaming bowl of porridge stands on a side table.

" Hide fingers ! " Restless little fingers axe tucked
away while Nursie says grace. One or two adven-
turous spirits, such as Kitty Ivy, join in the singing,
but most of the wee ones fix their gaze alternately
on "Nursie" and the porridge.

"Fold hands! 11 All eyes are closed while the
Toddlers say slowly, "God bless our good brekfus/'

THE LIFE OF A TODDLER 33

"Monitors!"

Alfie the Pickle, poor wee Alice, whose legs are
crooked with rickets, Kitty Ivy the Irrepressible,
and sturdy bonny Georgie trot out to "Nursie."
Their duty is to carry the porridge plates one by
one to the hungry Toddlers who await them. Little
fat hands grip the plates firmly as, lips tightly shut,
the "monitors" perform these tasks. Soon the
Toddlers are busy with the meal.

Only Jimmy is unhappy. Since he left his mother
an hour ago he has not ceased to wail. Jimmy is
pale and puffy. His eyes are red-rimmed and his
whole expression blank and stupid; his mouth is
open and his nose stuffed. He suffers all the time,
for every breath is drawn with difficulty. He cannot
taste or smell, and his poor discharging ears pain
him. Many Jimmies come to our Nursery.

"'E's a little devil/' says Kitty Ivy, pointing
reprovingly at him with her spoon. Kitty Ivy's
language is not always choice, and the constant
wailing gets on her nerves.

Breakfast is over, and off the Toddlers trot to
the garden. Three or four, led by Kitty Ivy, run
to the "little path." A dear little path it is, cut out
in the midst of a flower-bed. You must climb four
steps to reach it.

"One, two, four, five," pants Kitty Ivy. Arith-
metic is not her strong point, but she loves the
adventure of the "little path." She trots along
it and down the four steps at the end. Behind
her runs Georgie. /'One, two, three, four. Catch
me, Nursie," Georgie calls, and jumps the four
steps- Georgie is Kitty Ivy's hero. She watches
him, admiring.

Against the high wall at the bottom of the garden
ribstalls are fixed. Kitty Ivy, running off new
fields to conquer, halts before them. Eyes shining,

34 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

lips tightly closed, she climbs the ribstalls, followed
by Georgie.

The bunnies must then be visited. Kitty Ivy
offers Father Bunny mulberry leaves, but though
he stands up on his hind legs and sniffs them he
politely declines to taste. Happily at this moment
out comes Cook with the chickens' breakfast. Eager
Toddlers soon surround her, catching at her skirts
and crowding round the hen-house door. Algernon
and his wives come clucking up as the steaming
"hot inash" is poured into their dish. Kitty Ivy is
sorry for them. "Too'ot! Take it yound the sides/*
she advises Algernon, as he splutters and fusses.

It is now nearly ten o'clock, and our Toddlers
trot back to their shelters. On the long wooden tables
are set out inset boards, lacing and buttoning
frames, and sorting boxes. A rug is spread on the
floor, and one of Kitty's nurses is seated on it,
holding up a coloured bag of inviting appearance.
The Toddlers may go where they will. Kitty Ivy
chooses the rug, and soon the Toddlers have settled
down to work. But Jimmy stands in the doorway
and wails. A kindly student picks him up and tries
to comfort him.

"Take him to the Clinic/ 1 says Miss Atkins.
" Nurse will attend to his ears and he will see the
doctor later about the adenoids. Wait until we
have had handkerchief drill!"

This performance is undertaken solemnly and
thoroughly. Soft medicated paper is given out, and
the Toddlers are shown how to use it scientifically.
Handkerchief drill is carried out many times during
the day.

Kitty Ivy is now able to give her attention to the
" Wonder Bag," Delightful things come from this
hiding-place.

" What is this? " asks the Nurse Teacher.

THE LIFE OF A TODDLER 35

" A ball! " cries Tommy, holding out eager hands.

The teacher holds up the brightly-coloured ball
whilst the children talk about it. They speak of the
colours and the pictures on it. They roll it and
bounce it and throw it. Then they try to catch it.
More wonders come out of that bag, and Kitty Ivy
learns many new words and handles many objects.

After a while she goes off to the table. A board
of insets attracts her. "Quares!" she says, and
she takes the solid wooden squares out of their
corresponding holes and places them on the table.
Tommy is sitting beside her and is also working
with insets But he is a new-comer, and he blindly
seizes the insets and tries to force them into holes
that are too small. Kitty Ivy's method is a different
one. As she takes up each square she looks at it
carefully and compares it with the holes. Some-
times she runs her little forefinger round the edge.
After careful comparison she fits her square into
its hole. She makes no mistakes.

Soon she turns away from the board and takes
up a lacing frame. An eager young teacher, new to
the work, offers help.

"Want to do it mine self!'* says Kitty Ivy,
pushing her aside. A few minutes later, "I done
it!" she announces triumphantly. And the young
student looks on in respectful admiration.

Dinner-time. All the Toddlers must be washed,
whilst the cloths are laid and tables made ready.

"Fiss!" says Kitty Ivy, sniffing appreciatively
and beating on the table with her spoon. Then she
remembers her manners and lays down her spoon
beside her plate. She is a "monitor."

The first course consists of fish and potatoes
beaten into a cream with butter and milk; the
second course is suet pudding served with treacle.

By the time dinner is over more than one Toddler
D

36 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

is nodding. Little camp-beds await them, and
cosy rugs. Each little person, divested of boots,
is rolled up snugly and popped in bed. The
Sandman claims the Toddlers one by one.

Kitty Ivy is wakeful to-day. Her nurse sits
down beside her and smoothes her hair. " Tommy
is sleeping!" she says softly. "Poppy is sleeping!
Georgie is sleeping ! Kitty Ivy is sleeping too ! "

The Sandman has completed his round.

About half -past two in the afternoon Kitty Ivy
opens sleepy blue eyes once more. The Nursery
presents a busy scene, for half the babies are now
awake. Some are trotting about and some are in
the bathroom. The Nurse Teachers move in and
out amongst the children, folding blankets and
moving beds. Georgie is curled up in a ball, fast
asleep. Jimmy lies on his side breathing heavily
with flushed face. He makes little distressed move-
ments now and again. Tommy is sitting on the
floor lacing his boots, and little Violet has rolled
up her blanket and is nursing it like a doll.

Kitty Ivy jumps up. She puts on her own shoes,
and trots off happily to the bathroom to be " tidied "
for the afternoon. Clara and Kennerly, the pet
canaries, are singing a song of thankfulness for the
Indian summer. Bagheera, the Camp cat, sits on
the rail of the shelter washing her face with com-
mendable thoroughness.

Kitty Ivy is off. Red ribbon bow bobbing, she
trots round the garden with Tommy, visiting all
the pets in turn.

Back again to the shelter. Kitty's favourite
nurse welcomes her, holding up a large, brightly-
coloured picture.

"Jack and Jill went up the hill," cries Kitty Ivy,
flapping her hands and dancing with delight as she

THE LIFE OF A TODDLER 37

recognises it. Soon she and six of the other little
people are clustering round "Nursie," listening to
the adventures of Jack and nodding their heads in
solemn approval of the punishment that befell the
spiteful Jill. They chatter about the green grass,
the pail, Jill's blue overall and Jack's cap, to their
hearts' content.

The musical -box is now at work, inquiring
anxiously whether we are acquainted with the
Muffin Man. Tea-time draws near. Plates of
bread-and-butter spread with jam are placed upon
the tables, and the Toddlers get ready for the last
meal of the day.

Evening is drawing on and the fires are lighted.
The shelter looks cosy and inviting. Bread, jam
and milk soon disappear " down the red lane " and
the Toddlers draw their chairs in semicircles round
the red glow of the fire.

One group of the delighted children is watching
a humming-top spinning and whirling on its way;
more Toddlers are gathered round the Head of the
Department, who is singing nursery rhymes and
telling stories. Kitty Ivy is with the second group.

About the railings, little groups of mothers are
gathering now, and one by one the children trot
away, waving their hands in farewell.

" Kitty Iveel " Our Kitty runs across the shelter
and flings herself into the arms held out in greeting.
Then back she runs : " Good-bye, Nursie ! Good-bye,
Georgie!'* Kitty Ivy makes her little round of
farewells while "Mummie" chats awhile by the fire.

Kitty's mother is dreadfully tired. She has been
out all day charing. She is thankful to have the
work, for her husband is dying of consumption and
she has many mouths to feed besides Kitty Ivy's
little red one. This is the happiest moment of the
day for her. She cuddles Kitty Ivy beneath her

38 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

thin shawl, and her face is very tender. With a
cheery "Good-night, Nurse/' she sets off on her
homeward way.

And some are in the palace
On white and downy beds,
And some are in the hovel
With a clout beneath their head
And some are on the cold hard earth.
Whose mothers have no bread.

LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA.

CHAPTER VII

THE THREE- AND FOUR- YEAR-OLDS

Give me no mansions ivory white,
Nor palaces of pearl and gold;
Give me a child for all delight
Just four years old.

KATHARINE TYNAN HINKSON.

WHAT a remarkably active, energetic little person
is the healthy, happy three-year-old' All through
the hours of his waking day he must be doing,
experimenting, investigating, dramatising. Occupy
him fully all the time, and like the little girl with
the curl, he will be "very good indeed"; expect
him to sit still and do nothing, and he too can
be "horrid."

The three-year-old is a very different problem
from the Toddler. The Toddler will occasionally
sit still and gaze around him with interest not
so his elder brother! The Nurse Teacher in the
Toddlers' Shelters sometimes settles her little
charges at the tables five minutes before dinner
is served, and the babies will sit demurely waiting
the arrival of the meal, beating their fists upon
the table to the refrain of " Baa, Baa, Black Sheep/'
Once upon a time, when we were short of helpers,
we tried this plan with the threes and fours, but
the results were so dire that the experiment has
never been repeated!

The Nurse Teachers in this department require
infinite patience. " Hands off " must be their motto,
and they must learn to watch and wait while

39

40 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

Tommy does up his shoes, Rosie straggles with her
overall, and Billy helps himself to pudding. These
restless, eager little hands of the three-year-olds
are hungry for new experiences.

There is always plenty to do in an Open-Air
Nursery School. First there is the morning bath.
Every healthy three-year-old loves water. He loves
to turn on the taps, to play boats, to blow bubbles,
and to splash in all available puddles.

"Lor, Nurse, our Flossie was always a oner for
wa'er," says a mother, "but since she came to
Camp she's a reglar sponge, she is. I can't do
nothink with 'er." Each little three- and four-year-
old attempts his own ablutions of course under
careful supervision. He cleans his own teeth and
washes his own face and hands. He also lays the
table for meals, helps himself to pudding and
potatoes, and puts out the blankets and beds.

A great deal of apparatus must be devised to
keep him occupied on wet days especially and
this apparatus must be big, for it is the large
muscles which need exercise. He does not want
to handle small boxes and pick up tiny objects
at this stage of his development. He must learn
to recognise differences and resemblances, and to
this end many exercises in sorting and matching
must be devised. Amongst Miss McMillan's apparatus
for children of this age we have had provided for us
asbestos letter boards. The letters which fit into
the boards are coloured red and blue, and our little
ones love the exercise of taking them out and
fitting them into their proper places. There are
similar boards for teaching colours, and these, too,
are a great joy. Then we encourage our children
to sort shells, seeds, coloured sticks and letters,
into groups.

Out in the garden there is the herb bed to explore,

the pigeons and chickens to watch, the goat to
fondle, the hedgehog to gaze upon with awe. When
one sees these active little creatures trotting up
and down the garden paths in the sunshine, learn-
ing in Nature's own way, one realises the cruelty
of keeping them penned up in the classroom.

One day last week Ronnie, who is not very steady
on his legs as yet, fell down in the garden. Rosie,
aged three and a half, was sorry for him and helped
him up tenderly. "Don't cry, darling/ 7 she said,
"Rosie'll kiss it better." Ronnie was comforted
and toddled off. Rosie stood watching him thought-
fully. Then she ran up behind him and deliberately
knocked him over; immediately afterwards she
fussed and fondled him, evidently thoroughly enjoy-
ing the experience of acting the part of chief
comforter and friend.

Our little Deptford children, like all children
from poor areas, are slow to speak. They make use
of gestures whenever possible, and the language
they sometimes use when they first come to the
Nursery School is deplorable. A mother brought
her little four-year-old to the Camp one morning
last winter. She had a pathetic story to tell of
an invalid husband of work long sought and
now found. "But there's our Peter, Nurse/* she
said, "Drat 'im! What am I to do with the little
varmint?'' She hugged the varmint fondly.

Peter was a quaint wee figure. Clad in a bright
green jersey, with a scarlet muffler round his neck,
he stood confessed with his hands tucked firmly into
a black plush muff. " I 'ad that there muff orf of a
barrer," said Peter's mother proudly. "'E 'ollered
till I give it 'im, the little faggot.' 1

The Nursery School was full quite full! But
when Peter looked up, with his glorious blue eyes
fringed with the thickest of black lashes, and when

42 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

we saw the anxious pucker on his mother's brow
which told of her anxiety and pressing need, we
said weakly, "Come. We'll see if we can find room
for Peter."

The Head of the Department welcomed Peter
warmly and fell in love with him at first sight. We
christened him "Angel Face" and introduced him
at once to the new red engine. He played happily
for some time, firmly refusing to be parted from
the scarlet comforter or the velvet muff. Suddenly
he noticed that his mother had left him. "Lemme
go 'ome," he cried out, fist in one eye, muff in the
other. "I live in the 'Igh Street, Deptford, you
silly fool, and I wanner go 'ome." Alas* Not one
of us could pacify "the little varmint." He wept
aloud and refused to be comforted until the advent
of dinner. Replete with fish and treacle pudding,
he ceased wailing for a time. But when the beds
were set out for the afternoon nap Peter wailed
once more.

Miss Hum, her charges safe in bed, took Peter
on her knee. She tried him with pictures, puzzles
and beads. J Twas vain ; Peter would not take his
hands out of his muff, and he failed to show the
slightest interest in her proceedings.

At last she took the chalk and began to draw on
the board, talking quietly the while.

"What's that ? " demanded Peter.

"That's a boat."

"Who's that in it?"

"That's you, Peter."

"Me, is it? Oh, my Gawd," said puzzled Peter.
"Where are me legs?"

The teacher explained that his legs were not to
be seen because they were inside the boat. She
illustrated her point with a doll and a toy boat.
Peter was interested. He ran up to a student, who

THREE- AND FOUR-YEAR-OLDS 43

was passing through the Department, and tugged at
her apron.

"That's a boat/' he told her. "That's me in it.

You ^ can't see me legs. She says not. But

they're inside. She says so. Gimme some more
pudden."

Terribly ugly words soil the lips of our children
at times, and terribly sordid pictures of illness and
death are painted for them by the folks at home.

Nannie came to us last January. She was brought
by her sister, a child of twelve "Please, Miss
Davies, Daddy's wrote 'er name down, and please
Muwer's dead she died last week, and please will
you take Nannie in, because there ain't no one to
see to 'er, Daddy says." A few questions drew the
sad facts from the girl. Mother had just died,
leaving ten children, of whom Alice Mary was
the eldest and Nannie the youngest but one.
Father was going to try to get Nannie and Baby
into a Home.

" Our Alice Mary, come you 'ome," came a strident
voice from the gate. "All the washin'-up's awaitin'
for yer, and yer won't 'arf ketch it! "

Off trundled poor down-at-heels Alice Mary, and
we took Nannie into the shelter. She did not look
quite normal, certainly. Her thumb was finnly
tucked into her mouth and her head was on one
side. She was indescribably dirty. She said never
a word while we washed her, but when at last she
was seated by the fire hugging a doll : "My Mummie's
in a big 'ole/' she chanted. "My Mummie's in
'orspital. My Mummie's in a big dark 'ole, and she
won't never come out any more. They've put my
Mummie in a box in a big dark 'ole."

Dorcas Elizabeth, the curly-headed pet of the
Department, stood staring. Suddenly Nannie took
her thumb out of her mouth.

44 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

"Your Mummie's in a dark 'ole," she said,
pointing. Dorcas Elizabeth gasped.
"She isn't/' she replied, curtly and decisively.
"She is and she can't come out ! "
Dorcas Elizabeth drew herself up and replied
stoutly:

"My Mummie'll come out of the dark 'ole to me,
anyway. But she's scrubbing the kitchen floor, and
she " (here Dorcas forgot her English) " ain't in one."
With that she turned her back on the little heathen.
But poor little Nannie could not forget that awful
picture. She lost her ball one day. "Is it in a
dark 'ole, Nursie?" she asked. "Won't it never
come out?"

One of the most important tasks of the Nursery
School Teacher is to make the speech good, not only
from an oral but from a hygienic point of view.
The results are far-reaching. No handkerchief drill,
no operations for adenoids are really effective unless
they are followed up by good functioning.

The lethargy of the speaking organs is very
noticeable in the slum child. He is not called upon
to use the natural organs of speech in anything like
a vigorous way. When he first comes to the
Nursery School he declines even to say "yes" and
"no"; he prefers to answer by a nod or shake of
the head.

The slum child has veiy little use for his nose in
speaking. It is commonly said that when he has a
cold he speaks through his nose as a matter of
fact, when he has a cold he cannot speak through
his nose. The child who lives in a poor area often
suffers from chronic cold. He cannot say "n" or
"ng." His mouth is used merely as an orifice and
the lips have very little function. The child does
not utter his explosives (p, b, etc.) well. These
sounds require energy. The tongue shares the

THREE^ AND FOUR-YEAR-OLDS 45

lethargy of the lips and the organs he cannot say
"r" and "L" The aspirate is avoided or put in
the wrong place, and to complete matters the
gutturals are often left out altogether.

The work of getting clear, good, hygienic speech
from the children is of the utmost importance.
Besides the requisite attention which must be given
to the speech organs, it is important that the children
should have something to say and should want to
say it. For this reason we see that they have the
opportunity of making first-hand acquaintance
with all kinds of interesting objects. They love the
wonder bag a pretty coloured bag filled with
curious things. Perhaps it is the "P" bag, designed
to make the little folk work hard at that trouble-
some explosive. Inside we shall find, amongst
other things, a pen, a pencil, a potato, a pan, a
pocket knife. The children are required to say the
words carefully and clearly whilst they handle
the objects.

They find the animals, too, so wonderfully in-
teresting that they want to know all about them,
and they chatter happily as they fondle the goat
or watch the pigeons feeding out of Nurse's hand.
The beautiful, brightly-coloured flowers; the gay
ribbons and overalls all these things stimulate
them and make them want to talk.

We have also to face the problem of making
children listen. The loud noises they hear in baby-
hood have stunned them. They themselves speak
in rasping, hoarse voices. They have to be taught
to listen to soft sweet sounds and to speak in low
voices. This is one of the most difficult tasks of the
Nursery School Teacher, but it is of the utmost
importance in the development of the child.

When we have played and laughed, sung and
talked with our little ones in the Nursery School

46 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

Garden, we can appreciate the music of Tagore's
words:

When I bring you coloured toys, my child, I understand
why there is such a play of colour on clouds, on water, and
why flowers are painted in tints when I give coloured
toys to you, my child.

When I sing to make you dance I truly know why there
is music in leaves and why waves send their chorus of
voices to the heart of the listening earth when I sing to
make you dance.

When I bring sweet things to your greedy hands I know
why there is honey in the cup of the flowers and why fruits
are filled secretly with sweet juice when I bring sweet
things to your greedy hands.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SEVEN-YEAR-OLDS

THE age of seven is always a landmark in the life
of a human being. To ignore stopping-places in
education is to write without punctuation, and so
to miss the meaning of the developing life. It is
therefore of the greatest importance that we should
learn to understand the seven-year-old.

Let us take, then, our seven-year-old to-day. He
is, of course, a mixed product, and reflects not only
the new advantages of the Nursery School life, but
some of his home disadvantages as well. Nothing
can as yet be taken for granted in this home life.

If home conditions allow, he washes himself tho-
roughly in the morning before he comes to school;
if it is not possible for him to do this he runs straight
to the bathroom on his arrival, throws off his coat,
rolls up his sleeves and scrubs himself lustily. Teeth
and hair brushed, nails and ears beyond reproach,
he takes his share in the preparations for breakfast.
Perhaps it is his turn to carry the steaming porridge
from the kitchen; perhaps he is the "monitor"
appointed to lay the table for breakfast. Our "big
children " in the " top school " are a very pretty sight
in the early morning, seated round their gay tables
with their "shining morning faces" glowing with
health and contentment. At each table a "father"
or a "mother" presides, and it is the duty of these
important individuals to serve the porridge and to
preserve the decorum of the breakfast-table.

47

48 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

The children want to talk, and they have a great
deal to say to one another.

"Seems to me Thor's about to-day," remarked
one httle chap on a stormy morning recently and
great was the annoyance of the whole class a while
ago when Frigga freely besprinkled Derbyshire and
the North with feathers, but entirely refrained from
shaking her bed over Deptford.

One good illustration of double life in school and
home appears in language training. The children
at this stage become keenly interested in their own
speech, in the speech of others, and in derivations.
They are anxious to remedy their own speech
defects, and good-naturedly ready to criticise and
help one another.

"You'll never be able to take a good part in the
play, you know," said one small maiden scornfully
to another. "You still drop your aitches!" The
snubbed one sniffed woefully.

"Well, you you can't do sums, anyway," was
all the retort she could think of at the moment. But
she made valiant efforts forthwith to conquer the
troublesome aspirate.

"Lor, Miss," said one of the mothers the other
day, "whatever has got our Katie? She was a-
rarryin' on somethink orful in the yard the other
day, and when 'er Daddy told 'er to 'old 'er noise
she says as perky as you please that she is a-
practisin' gutturals for Miss McMillan."

Our seven-year-olds play with words as a cat
plays with a mouse.

"It's a lugubrious day," remarks George one
rainy morning in November, as he hangs up his
dripping coat.

"These flowers are passing sweet/' quotes Elsie,
sniffing them appreciatively as she arranges them
in the best blue vase.

THE SEVEN-YEAR-OLDS 49

The children's mind-store is of a rather strange
character. Much of it is sombre, if not gruesome.

They are all well versed in the mysteries of
life and death. Many of them have seen death,
and all of them have suffered. The experiences
through which they have passed have, in some
cases, made them wonderfully sympathetic.

"I couldn't do my sums last night/' says John.
"Mummie was washing and Grannie was in the
parlour. Mummie said she would let Grannie lie
in the parlour till the funeral was over, because it
was the best room and Grannie liked it when she
was alive."

"We don't like 'born' babies at our house,"
remarks Grace sadly. "They make Daddy angry
and they make Mummie cry. Besides, there isn't
any more room for them in the big bed."

"My Mummie's gone to hospital and Daddy says
if she dies he doesn't know who's to pay for the
funeral," says Harry, coming to school one morning
in tears.

" You can get buried for eight-pound-ten," George,
uncanny in his wisdom, informs him. "But why
wasn't your mother insured, anyway?"

No one is more keenly interested than the slum
child in watching the opening of the flowers, the
budding of the trees. He loves his own garden, in
which he works with a will, and he watches with
delight the manoeuvres of ants, spiders and bees.

Bearing all this in mind, let us now turn to the
larger question of education proper. Let us make
a retrospect and see what has been done or what
should have been done for him by the Nursery
School.

To begin with he is in good health and, what is
almost more important, he has the desire to realise
and to express th growing life within him. There

50 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

is a great literature on play. Into what does play
evolve? Into primitive art, and we must not delay
the child's entrance into this world of romance.

His first and greatest impulse is of course towards
the primitive arts. Every pulse and every heart-
throb, every movement of the life stream in his
veins urges him to find the extension of this rhythmic
life. That is why his feet cannot keep still when he
hears the barrel-organ that is why he loves gesture.
The whole battle of life is largely the effort for the
extension of consciousness. And these rhythmic
movements which he so readily practises under
the right influences deepen the organic consciousness
and finally raise the half-submerged creature out of
the lethargy of early childhood. Considered from
this standpoint, Art is of course Hygiene in its
higher development; Hygiene which wins, however,
not merely health but new consciousness and new
power. The awful cloak of superstition which
drugged the intelligence of mankind in the Middle
Ages and in past Reformation time has obscured
the real meaning of Art, and has led us far away
from the condition of the glorious Singers of Israel,
who "made a joyful noise unto the Lord" in wor-
shipping, who heard the hills clap their hands, and
who danced before the Ark with all their might.
Something of all this enhancement of life must be
recaptured by our children.

The first initiation must be in large movements
that engage the whole body. Through these h
must deepen his feeling not only for rhythm bu1
for melody, and this brings into action all th*
nerves as well as the muscles and gives him his firsl
feeling of the meaning of music.

Music is in all the greater things. "Go deej
enough," says Carlyle, "and you will find musi
everywhere." A child should be allowed, even a

I

3 w
S H

ss

THE SEVEN-YEAR-OLDS 51

this early stage, to take part in the deep and won-
derful things by learning the primitive art of
singing and dancing.

These arts are much nearer to the child than even
the plastic arts. He is prepared for them so early in
life that we can hardly trace the moment when the
music centres are developed and the capacity for
appreciation of rhythm and melody is born. These
facts are now widely appreciated, as our many
forms of eurhythmies show. There is also the art
of eurhythmy, which aspires to make the whole
body interpret the meaning of language and of
spiritual consciousness. Prepared by these arts
the child reaches the climax of play in dramatic
art, and we have ample evidence to show that,
allowed to enter by this door, he finds, even at the
age of seven or eight, the meaning of some of the
highest poems and psalms as well as the lyrics.

Dramatic art, like play, opens the door to all the
arts. It is therefore the best medium of expression
for the child, and it encourages him to put forth his
whole power without strain.

Here is a picture of the children acting the
Midsummer Night's Dream. It is not claimed that
they are exceptionally beautiful or exceptionally
clever, but it is claimed that the great miracles of
life are illustrated in these children. These lips
express the fact that they have been opened
these arms and hands, and especially these fingers,
show that the life currents are well aflow. The little
figure which holds all the rest like a magnet is not
necessarily more developed than they. All have
the power to attract and attend, and all have plainly
awakened from the lethargy which is death. To con-
tinue their education will be a glorious task, for the
children will be keen allies of the teacher. They
now want to learn.

52 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

"Our Top Class" at the Rachel McMillan Nursery
School have a little room of their own. Here they
store their books, models and other cherished
possessions, and here they sit on a winter evening
after tea. Their ages vary from seven to nine years.

They are very quiet to-night. Bertie and Lily
have taken books from the "library" shelves. They
are lost to the world. Bertie is reading Oliver Twist,
and Lily Gulliver's Travels. Gladys and Cissie are
sketching. Rosie is very busy coaching Amy in her
part in the Midsummer Night's Dream. Amy has
only recently had the honour of joining "The
Top Class," and her speech is a little halting still.
Rosie is very much in earnest, for Amy must not
be allowed to disgrace them.

Ruby and Edna are busy with their needles.
"We're making jumpers," Edna explains. "They
are to wear on our holiday, when we go to the
Avery Hill. Mine's green and Ruby's is blue."

"I'm making the table for the anchorite's cell,"
volunteers George. "It's rather shaky about the
legs but I don't think that matters very much.
He wouldn't fuss about a thing like that, would
he? He'd be too busy praying."

"And I am writing a play," says Dorothy, open-
ing wide her deep blue eyes. " It's all my very own.
It's about the Page who wanted to be a Knight.
Miss Campbell told us about him. Perhaps, if it
is good enough, we shall act it some day."

PART II

CHAPTER IX

THE BEGINNING OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN
NURSERY SCHOOL

I desire to live worthily all my days, so that after death I
may leave behind me a record of good work done.

KING ALFRED.

IF we wish to trace the development of the Rachel
McMillan Nursery School we must go back to the
year 1908, when the first London School Clinic
was opened by the Misses McMillan in the upper
room of a County Council Elementary School
at Bow.

If we acknowledged to the full our responsibility
for the children of the slums if we really felt that
they were our own flesh and blood what should we
do for them first? Should we leave them to run in
the streets, and then send them, with their sore
eyes and running ears, to swell the mighty classes
in the elementary schools? I think not. I am quite
sure we should attend first to their bodily needs.

The Misses McMillan are educationists first and
foremost. But they did not propose to train the
minds of these children until they had healed their
bodies. Miss Margaret McMillan's experience on
the School Board at Bradford had shown her the
terrible amount of preventable suffering among
school children, and she had worked hard to obtain
medical inspection for them.

The clauses making medical inspection com-
pulsory appeared for the first time in the Bill of

53

54 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

1907. They included the creation of a Medical
Board at Whitehall, and there is now placed upon
us the great responsibility of knowing the real
condition of the children of this country. The
extent of the evil can be gathered from Sir
George Newman's report. The agencies which have
been created to deal with it are as yet in their
infancy, but the earliest and most developed is
the School Clinic,

The first London Clinic was removed from Bow
to Deptford early in 1910. There are eight hundred
of these centres throughout the country. Children
receive treatment in these Clinics for the three
great classes of disease teeth, eye, ear and throat
troubles, and minor ailments generally. It should
be noted here that though the Clinics were intended
primarily for children of school age, from the very
first the Misses McMillan received little ones under
five years of age at the Deptford Health Centre.

Miss Margaret McMillan writes at length on
"School Clinics" in the Camp School. 1 She tells
of the good work they have done how "thousands
have been saved from early and chronic ill-health
through their help." But she also shows us that,
though the Clinic has cured thousands, a very
great deal of time and money is wasted in alle-
viating diseases which are preventable and should
be stamped out. She tells how in the last three
months of 1913 the Deptford Nurse treated nine
hundred and fifty cases of -skin diseases, and how
within the same period nine hundred and twenty-
seven of these returned after being cured to have
the same kind of disease treated by drug and lotion
The diseases of the slums will never be stamped
out until the housing conditions are improved, and
until England grants education and nurture to all

1 The Camp School. Published by George Allen and Unwin.

THE BEGINNING 55

her children. The children of the poor, as well as
the children of the well-to-do, need sunlight and
freedom for development. They must be educated
in healthy surroundings. Those diseases which are
preventable should never attack them.

This was felt very strongly. So a small Nursery
School and Baby Camp was opened in the garden
of Evelyn House, Deptford.

This house was given free of rent by Mr. and Mrs.
John Evelyn in the year 1911. The garden was
also used as a Night Camp for girls over eight years
of age.

In 1913 the London County Council was
approached with regard to the vacant plot of
land known as the Stowage Site. This site was
designed at the time for a new elementary school,
but permission was granted to the Misses McMillan
to erect a shelter here and continue their experiment.
On a very stormy day in March 1914 the little
school was moved to its new quarters. It soon
numbered thirty children, and all through the
summer of 1914 the little ones lived and slept in
the open air. It was a Night as well as a Day Camp.

Miss McMillan gives us the record of the first
eighty-seven children who entered the Camp the
eldest of these children was five, and the youngest
three months old. Nearly every one of the eighty-
seven suffered from debility; twenty-two had two
distinct ailments, nine had three. Nine out of the
eighty-seven were normal. Yet all these children
were supposed to be well.

The progress made by the children was wonderful.
This is shown by the following quotation from Dr.
Eder's report on the summer of 1914 (Dr. Eder was
Senior Medical Officer of the Deptford School Clinic) :

Baby Camp. This was started m Church Street in the spring
(loth March) with six children under school age; by the end

56 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

of the summer twenty-nine children were living and sleep-
ing in the Camp. There was hardly any illness even during
the hot months ; the children put on weight regularly Their
sleep is reported to have been most quiet: in every way
they enjoyed the open space, which was large for these tiny
ones. There seems to have been marked mental improve-
ment as well as physical during the past five months up
to loth August.

These children had all their meals in school; they now
have dinner. This interesting experiment has been remark-
ably successful and has exceeded any anticipation of our
own. It is one that is capable of great development, and
production of good to the rising generation It has' been
generally recognised that the proper care of children under
school age forms a serious gap in the measures that have
been suggested or ought to be put in practice during recent
years to ensure a healthier or more vigorous people. The
open-air camp for these babies is an endeavour to bridge
the gap, and it is a method of treatment and child nurture
that might be well encouraged and developed.

/Q--n~i\ /DUDLEY BURNEY.
(Signed) | M D

The Nursery was at this time entirely voluntary,
and had not as yet many friends, while the site
could have been claimed by the London County
Council at any time for its original purpose.

In August 1914 came the outbreak of the Great
War. The Ministry of Munitions was anxious to
secure the work of married women in the munition
factories. The Misses McMillan appealed to the
Ministry of Munitions through the Board of Educa-
tion, with the result that a grant of sevenpence a day
was promised for every child of a munition worker*
In spite of this help the school was carried on under
great difficulties. The staff consisted at first of
teachers, later on, when young babies were admitted,
it was found necessary to engage nurses. Most of
the good nurses of England were engaged in war
work at home or abroad, and the difficulty of pro-
curing a good staff in such a neighbourhood, and
with such poor equipment as was then possible,

THE BEGINNING 57

was very great. The situation was saved by the
heroism of Miss Rachel McMillan. She bathed and
tended the babies herself when skilled help could
not be obtained, and it was her loving hands which
lent refinement to the poor equipment. All the
ailing babies, we are told, held out their little arms
to "Miss Rachel" and she instinctively knew
which of her little ones needed her most.

Early in the year 1917 the strain proved too
much for her, and on her birthday, 25th March,
she passed over to the other side. Here she works
for us and watches over us still.

Thus star by star declines

Till all are passed away,

As morning high and higher shines

To peace and perfect day

Nor sink these stars m empty night,

They hide themselves in Heaven's own light.

CHAPTER X

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN
NURSERY SCHOOL

Educate every child as if he were your own RACHEL
McMiLLAN.

EARLY in the year 1917 the Misses McMillan had
won the consent of the Board of Education to the
extension of the Nursery School premises, half
the cost of which was to be met by the Board. On
3rd August, 1917, Mr. H. A. L. Fisher, Minister
of Education, proclaimed the new premises open,
and the school became the memorial of Miss
Rachel McMillan.

Two years later the London County Council
entered into an agreement with Miss Margaret
McMillan, in virtue of which she was allowed to
continue the experiment for five years on condition
that she relinquished all claim to the property,
including" the buildings, in September 1924. The
school received the first grant from the London
County Council in September 1920.

In the summer of 1921 the Nursery School was
full to overflowing. There was an average attend-
ance of one hundred and thirty-five children, and
almost daily we were obliged to turn away mothers
who were seeking admittance for their children.
The school was now recognised by the Board of
Education as a Training Centre for certificated
teachers, and we were also training private students
for the Nursery School work.

Miss McMillan was very anxious to try the
58

THE DEVELOPMENT 59

experiment of a large Nursery School. She there-
fore approached the Council with a view to extend-
ing the school, and building an additional shelter
to accommodate one hundred more children. In
the Memorandum which she presented to the
Council Miss McMillan stated that the objects to
be attained by the extension of this school were
as follow:

1. The testing at last by experiment what the
size of these schools should be.

2. The actual knowledge of what they should cost.

3. The testing by experiment of how the staff
should be trained.

4. The effect of the Nursery School on the general
health and intelligence as shown:

(a) In the need for attendance at Clinics of
Nursery School children.

(i) In their general health as recorded on then-
records, weight, attendance and aspect.

(c) In their progress (mental), particularly in the
later years of Nursery School life.

The new building was opened on 5th September,
1921, and the Managing Committee was extended
under the chairmanship of Mr. Dence, L.C.C., the
present Mayor of Greenwich. The original committee
had consisted of Miss Rachel and Miss Margaret
McMillan, Mr. and Mrs. John Evelyn, Mr. and
Mrs. Walter Coates, and Mr. Joseph Pels.

Miss Margaret McMillan and Mrs. John Evelyn
still represent this original committee, the vacant
seats of which are taken by Mr. Dent, the well-
known publisher, the Rev. Arthur Meek, Superin-
tendent of the Deptford Mission, and Mr. Baker,
for many years a resident of the parish. Represent-
ing the London County Council are Mr. Dence, the

60 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

chairman (Moderate), Mr. Watts (Labour), Miss
Nicholson, Mrs. Monk, and Mrs. Wells.

It was decided that the two departments (that
is, the original or voluntary school and the new
department) were to be run as one school. There
was to be one superintendent and one central
kitchen, where the cooking and preparation of
meals was to take place.

The new department was formally opened on
22nd November, 1921, by Her Majesty the Queen.
This was Queen Mary's second visit to the Rachel
McMillan Nursery School. She has always shown
a keen interest in the development of this work.

The winter of 1921-22 was a difficult one. In
December 1921 an epidemic of influenza raged in
South-East London, and many young children fell
victims to the disease during the Christmas holidays.
The attendance on the last day of the Christmas
term was one hundred and eighty-four. We came
back to a school of one hundred and thirty-one
children. It is a fact worthy of record that there
were no deaths and no cases of serious illness
amongst the children of the voluntary or older-
established school. The children's power of resist-
ance had been built up by the good plain food and
fresh air they had enjoyed for months, in some
cases for years. But two little ones from the new
department died during the Christmas holidays.
They had not sufficient strength to fight the disease. 1
Outside the Nursery School the children died in
great numbers.

In February 1921 there was an epidemic of
measles in South -East London. Measles is the
one infectious disease we dread in the Nursery
School. We have, of course, isolated cases of scar-

1 In neither case was the death actually due to influenza. It
was caused by a second disease contracted whilst the chUd was
suffering from influenza.

THE DEVELOPMENT 61

let fever, diphtheria, and whooping-cough. These
diseases we do not fear, for they do not spread in
the open air. Measles is our bugbear. But we have
never closed our school for any epidemic, and it
was not our intention to do so now. Dr. Margaret
Hogarth, under whose medical care we are, and
who visits our school weekly, was also averse to
closing the school. She advised as follows:

"Feed the children well. Watch most carefully
for the first symptoms of the disease. Then isolate
at once. Visit the parents and see that, if possible,
the child is put to bed at once and kept warm."

The epidemic raged in the neighbourhood. The
new department, as was to be expected, suffered
first and most severely. The Staff of the Nursery
School visited the homes and advised the mothers.
The Medical Officers of Deptford and Greenwich
were more than kind, and every case was kept under
supervision. Dr. Hogarth examined each patient
carefully for after effects, and the result was that
out of forty-one cases we had only one instance of
running ears attributable to the disease there
were no other after effects. Surely this new experi-
ence proves that the little ones who came under
our care were better off than those who were left to
play in the streets.

The new department has steadily progressed in
numbers since the Easter of 1922. During the last
three months (March to June 1923) there has been
an average attendance of two hundred and twelve
children under five years of age in the Rachel
McMillan Nursery School. The attitude of the
parents is very friendly, and they are beginning
to take pride in sending their children to school
dean and tidy. There is already a long waiting-
list. Soon we shall need to build again.

CHAPTER XI

OTHER OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOLS

THE Jellicoe Nursery School grew out of the needs
of a war club for women. Mrs. Evelegh, the Hono-
rary Treasurer of the Jellicoe Club, Rochford Street,
Kentish Town, originated the idea, and it was she
who persuaded the committee to annex two rooms in
the club house for this purpose. These rooms were
simply and artistically decorated, and the cost of
furnishing was met largely by the family of the late
Mrs. Whitehorne, who was much beloved by the
dub members, and whose sister, Miss Black, is an
active member of the committee of the Jellicoe
Nursery School.

This Nursery School was opened in 1916, and Miss
Cromarty was appointed its first superintendent.
In 1918 the increased number of children rendered
a change necessary. The idea of an Open-Air
Nursery School appealed to Mrs. Evelegh, who felt
strongly the urgent need of the children for sunshine
and fresh air, and who had been distressed by the
frequent outbreaks of slight epidemics in the school.

An appeal was made to the committee for sub-
scriptions, and the four hundred pounds raised was
spent in adapting a cowshed and yard at the back
of the club. In 1921, when the need for more accom-
modation was felt, another schoolroom, staffroom
and a cloakroom were adapted from a second shed.
The school is now recognised for forty children. It
has been in the receipt of a grant since 1918.

62

OTHER SCHOOLS 63

The children thoroughly enjoy their open-air life.
They run in and out through the wide-open doors
from the schoolroom to the quaint little garden
with its cobble-stones and gay flower-beds. The
utmost freedom compatible with social tolerance is
the rule in this school, where the little ones serve
their own dinners, brush up and tidy the garden,
and make their school beautiful in many ways.

There are three Open-Air Nursery Schools in
Bradford: Princeville, Lilycroft, and St. Anne's
Roman Catholic Nursery School. St. Anne's is the
largest school, and owes its existence to the great
zeal of Father Daley.

In 1920 Miss Chignell, the superintendent of the
Rachel McMillan Nursery School, went to Bradford
at the request of the Education Committee to
organise these schools. The two Council schools,
Princeville and Lilycroft, are beautiful. The plan
of both buildings is on the lines of the Rachel
McMillan Nursery School, but money has been spent
freely on every detail of the equipment. Opening on
the fairly wide rooms there is a covered way, and
beyond a large walled garden. The bathrooms
are well equipped and arranged, and the whole is
on one floor. All questions of diet are successfully
solved by the help of the splendid Bradford School
Kitchen, which sends the food out to these and
other schools. The climate of Bradford does not
lend itself to the easy evolution of a beautiful
garden, but, in spite of the late spring and early
autumn, the school playgrounds are gay and
charming places.

The three schools vary in average attendance
from thirty to seventy children, and these children
bear witness to the value of their surroundings and
training. In Bradford, where a single firm employs

64 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

over a thousand married women, there can be no
doubt as to the need for the Nursery School.

No school has had a more tragic history than the
Scottish School in St. Agnes Road, Dundee. And
yet perhaps for that reason no other has a future
that is more assured. In 1920 Miss Mabel Brydie
and Miss Jessie Porter, students at the Rachel
McMillan Training Centre, took up the task of
developing the new Nursery School, started by a
small group of people in Dundee.

The building, for it is not an entirely open-air
school, is part of an old poorhouse, but it is set
on a beautiful hill with woodland and lawns all
around it. Here Miss Brydie began her work for the
children of the jute workers. The school is notable
for its wonderful success in gaining the friendship
and support of the parents.

Miss Brydie died in December 1922, of a disease
contracted in the course of her work with the poorest
children. The school is now carried on under the
direction of Miss Porter.

Amongst the schools which are more or less open-
air, in that they have a large garden attached to
them, is the George Dent Nursery School at Dar-
lington. All the arrangements of this school have
a subtle distinction and beauty, which owes its
existence probably to the fact that it is a memorial
school, founded in memory of a pioneer teacher,
Mr. George Dent, father of Mr. J. M. Dent of
Everyman's Library.

Mr. Dent was fortunate in having as his colla-
borator Miss Freda Hawtrey, who was at that time
Principal of Darlington Training College.

In the entrance hall of the Nursery School is a
lovely head by DonateUo, beautifully framed in
marble and bearing the words: "Out of the mouths'

OTHER SCHOOLS 65

of babes and sucklings He has perfected praise."
The beauty of this httle memorial hall is borne
out in all the quiet rooms where the children work
and dine, and in the fine conservatory, which is
now the bathroom, and which opens out on a large
and beautiful garden.

The superintendent of this beautifully equipped
and conducted school is Miss Drogan.

No description can be attempted here of the
many beautiful indoor Nursery Schools: the
Netting Hill Nursery School, under Miss Reid,
so deservedly famous for its social as well as its
educational work, the Somers Town, the Mary
Ward, Romney Road and Union Jack Nursery
Schools.

The Gipsy Hill Training College and Practising
School has the great advantage of having at its
head Miss de Lissa, the well-know pioneer of infant
education in Australia. Then there is the Nursery
School attached to Goldsmiths' College.

The Mather Training College, Manchester, through
its principal, Miss Grace Owen, has won fame not
only in this country but in America. The students
in the Training College practise in the College
Nursery School, which is ably conducted by Miss
Marriott, the Ardwick Nursery School, Manchester,
of which Miss Steele is the superintendent, and the
Salford Nursery School under Miss Bauerkeller.

PART III

CHAPTER XII

THE NEED FOR THE NURSERY SCHOOL

THE real need for the Nursery School has long been
recognised by the people of intelligence who are
really interested in the nurture and education of
the children of the nation.

Our welfare centres are concerned with the health
of the baby up to the age of two. The school doctor
examines the five-year-old when he enters the
elementary school. What of those precious years
between two and five?

Dr. E. W. Hope, Medical Officer of Health for
Liverpool, in an article published in Defective
Children, writes as follows:

The Medical Inspection of children . . . has revealed
an amount of mental and physical suffering amongst
children previously quite unsuspected suffering in most
cases remediable, in many preventable

Dr. McGregor, Medical Officer of Health for
Glasgow, writing in the same book, states:

The Notification of Birth Act has secured supervision of
the infant up to the age of one year The child then passes
put of observation, and when it has arrived at school age
irremediable damage has too often already been done
deformities preventable by ordinary care and intelligence
have been allowed to become permanent. ... In Glasgow
the prevalence of severe rickets is one of the object lessons
of life in the poorer districts. We have seen that the most
important preventive and curative measures are fresh air,
exercise, adequate and suitable diet. In so far as these

66

NEED FOR NURSERY SCHOOL 67

conditions are available for the growing child, this disease
will be prevented or the severity of the attack mitigated.
... In Glasgow, where rickets account for over one half
of the physically defective children in the schools, the
average cost of educating these children is from two to
three times that of educating the ordinary school child.

Let us now read the following extract from Sir
John Gorst's Children of the Nation:

From the point of view of public health these poor little
children between babyhood and school age form a very
important section of the population. They are the nursery
in which deadly microbes and the germs of infectious
diseases grow and multiply . . . The incipient smallpox
or measles or diphtheria or scarletina which the doctors
could have immediately diagnosed and stamped out runs
its course, infection is earned into the streets and the
schools. The disease of tuberculosis . is a terribly
fatal disease in this country, causing one-eighth of all the
deaths. The favourite breeding-ground of the tuberculosis
microbe is the bodies of ill-nourished children. By these
they are earned into the streets and into the schools with-
out recognition and check, and this affects the bodies of
other children and of the whole population.

Finally let us examine the report of Major Elmslie,
the London County Council Medical Officer of
Physically Defective Schools.

"Infantile Paralysis has now become the most
important cause of crippling among children in
London," he says, and he gives a table showing the
year of onset for the disease in five hundred and
fifty-nine cases. Three hundred and five cases
begin between the ages of two and four, as against
thirty-six between the ages of five and seven.

Surely we have here the conclusive proof of the
need of nurture for our little ones during these
critical years!

Are not clinics, sanatoria, special schools, work-
houses, industrial schools, not to mention prisons
and asylums, a heavy tax on the ratepayer? It is
not an exaggeration to say that a quarter the cost

68 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

of the maintenance of a hopelessly diseased or de-
fective child would maintain four normal children
in good health.

The torrent of diseased children that is pouring
ceaselessly through our school clinics would surely
in time begin to shrink if the causes of their ailments
were dealt with in the earlier years.

The gap in the national system which allowed for
no education and no nurture for children between
the ages of two and five years was bndged by Mr.
Fisher in 1918. This Education Act, if it had been
carried into full operation as far as the clauses on
the Nursery School education are concerned, would
have gone far to solve the whole question of nurture
for young children. Mr. Fisher indicated that
Nursery Schools (preferably open-air) should be
established for children of two to five years. In
his speech delivered in the House of Commons on
loth August, he states:

We do not desire to compel the provision of Nursery
Schools, but we intend to enable such schools, attendance
at which must be voluntary, to be aided from the rates, and
we believe that in the development of these schools, which
will, we trust, often be open-air schools, we may reasonably
look for a real improvement in the health of young children.

Unfortunately, when the Geddes Axe fell, this
clause had only been put into operation on a small
scale. But everything that has been tested since
the year 1918 in regard to these schools shows that
the clauses themselves were entirely necessary.

The most urgent need for this new reform is
surely to be found in the poorest areas, where the
wastage of child-life goes on unchecked. Here
indeed we must be as one, however divided in
politics, creed or temperament. There is Surely no
argument that can reasonably be advanced against
the provision of Nursery Schools in the slum areas.

CHAPTER X

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE RACHEL MCMILLAN
NURSERY SCHOOL

Educate every child as if he were your own RACHEL

McMlLLAN.

EARLY in the year 1917 the Misses McMillan had
won the consent of the Board of Education to the
extension of the Nursery School premises, half
the cost of which was to be met by the Board. On
3rd August, 1917, Mr. H. A. L. Fisher, Minister
of Education, proclaimed the new premises open,
and the school became the memorial of Miss
Rachel McMillan.

Two years later the London County Council
entered into an agreement with Miss Margaret
McMillan, in virtue of which she was allowed to
continue the experiment for five years on condition
that she relinquished all claim to the property,
including" the buildings, in September 1924. The
school received the first grant from the London
County Council in September 1920.

In the summer of 1921 the Nursery School was
full to overflowing. There was an average attend-
ance of one hundred and thirty-five children, and
almost daily we were obliged to turn away mothers
who were seeking admittance for their children.
The school was now recognised by the Board of
Education as a Training Centre for certificated
teachers, and we were also training private students
for the Nursery School work.

Miss McMillan was very anxious to try the
58

70 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

five children. We have come to the conclusion that
it is more satisfactory, as well as more economical,
to take the smaller group. Where there are fifty
children we need a head and an assistant. In the
smaller shelters the head can dispense with a full-
time assistant if she has a capable student-teacher
to help her.

The question of the grouping of the children
inside the shelter has now to be faced. We find
that eight Toddlers make a satisfactory group, ten
three-year-olds and twelve four-year-olds. Of course
the question cannot really be disposed of as easily as
this, for the number of children the teacher can
manage at one time depends almost entirely on what
she happens to be teaching at that particular time.

The head of each department must, then, have
three to five helpers. What type of helper shall
they be? We, in this school, are fortunate, for side
by side with the Nursery School the Training Centre
for Nursery School teachers has sprung up, and so
the problem is solved for us, as for all Nursery Schools
attached to Training Colleges. But what of the other
Nursery Schools? Surely it would be an excellent
plan if all Nursery Schools could be centres of
training for different types of social and educa-
tional work. Would not training in the Nursery
School work be of great use to the future helper in
the welfare centre, the district visitor, the private
nurse and the missionary? When the great possi-
bilities afforded by this type of training are fully
realised, there should be no difficulty in the staffing
of our Nursery Schools.

Domestic Arrangements

There should be a small washhouse in connection
with every large Nursery School. Towels, table-

THE STAFFING ARRANGEMENTS 71

cloths, overalls, are constantly in need of washing,
and it is much more satisfactory to have this need
met on the premises.

The kitchen should occupy a central place amongst
the buildings, and the cook should be carefully
chosen, for her work is of the utmost importance.
In the Rachel McMillan Nursery School the pre-
paration and cooking of the meals for three hundred
children is undertaken by one cook and one helper.
When the meals are ready the food is placed in
covered vessels and carried to the different depart-
ments by the helpers.

Diet

The most important item of the children's diet is,
of course, the milk. The directions issued by the
Medical Department of the London County Council
are to the effect that every child shall be supplied
with one pint of milk daily for drinking the pudding
milk to be allowed for extra. In practice we find
that every child does not consume one pint of milk
a day. The children who have been a long time
with us drink the most milk. Sometimes when a
little one first comes to the Nursery School he will
hardly touch milk unless it is sweetened or flavoured
with cocoa. But time soon remedies this. Acting
under the directions of our Medical Officer, Dr.
Hogarth, we pasteurise our milk and strain it it
is never boiled.

For breakfast we give the children porridge three
or four times a week cocoa and bread and dripping
the remaining days.

The same dinner is never given twice in one week.
We have meat dinners twice a week, and one fish
dinner; on the remaining days we give eggs, soup,
savoury pudding, or vegetable stew, according to

72 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

the time of year. For "afters" (to quote the
children) we give various kinds of milk pudding,
treacle suet, jam roly, currant dumpling, custard,
chocolate pudding, stewed fruit, etc. Always with
their dinner the children eat a hard rusk.

Tea consists of milk or cocoa with bread and"
butter or margarine, jam or cake.

Menu showing dinners given during one week at
the Rachel McMillan Nursery School:

WINTER SUMMER

Monday Meat and Potatoes Scrambled Eggs, Pota-
Currant Pudding toes and Peas

Toddlers, Milk Pudding Jam Pudding

Tuesday Vegetable Stew Meat, Potatoes and

Treacle Pudding (Suet) Vegetables

Rice Pudding and Raw
Fruit

Wednesday Fish Pie Fish Pie

Jam Roly Custard and Fruit

Thursday Meat and Potatoes Vegetable Stew
Rice Pudding Oranges Treacle Pudding

Friday Soup and Dumplings Meat and Potatoes
Batter Pudding Cornflour Shape

We find that the appetites of the children improve
very much when they have been in attendance for
some weeks. The regularity of the life, the open air
and the opportunity for exercise soon make good
trenchermen of the inmates of the Nursery School.

CHAPTER XIV

THE FINANCE OF THE NURSERY SCHOOL

"Men cease to regard money ?" cries Bobus of Houndsditch.
"What else do all men strive for? The very Bishop informs me
that Christianity cannot get on without a minimum of four
thousand five hundred m its pocket Cease to regard money?
That will be Doomsday m the afternoon'"

"Oh, Bobus, my opinion is somewhat different. My opinion
is that the Higher Powers have not yet determined on destroying
this Lower World. A respectable, ever-increasing minority \^ho
do strive for something higher than money,*! with confidence
anticipate. . . . Thou wilt not join our small minority, thou?
Not until Doomsday in the afternoon? Well then at least thou
wilt join it, thou and the majority in mass ' " CAKLYLE

WE are told by those in authority that we shall not
see Nursery Schools established in the country as
part of the educational system until we bring down
the cost to a figure not much higher than that which
represents the cost of keeping a child in the infant
school This is the problem which faces the Nursery
School teacher to-day.

We must have more air space than the authorities
have allowed the infant schools in the past, and we
must have a garden. But the buildings we require
are very inexpensive, and so is the furniture.

We must have more teachers. But why should
we not work out a system by means of which many
of our young people may receive a training in return
for the services they render the children?

We must provide food for the children. But we
have proved that we can provide a generous diet
which will satisfy the requirements of the Medical
Department of the London County Council for an

73

74 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

average cost of half a crown a week for each child.
In some districts the parents will be able to pay
the whole cost of the food, but in slum areas of
course it is often impossible for them to do so u

We must have a big school (two to four hundred
children), for only so are we able to staff economically.

As a result of our experiment in the Rachel
McMillan Nursery School this year we can definitely
state that the total cost for each child works out at
a little more than fourteen pounds a year. It must
be remembered, when considering this cost, that we
supply the children with three meals a day, and that
the majority of parents are unable to pay the whole
cost of the food; in districts where perhaps the
need is not so great, the cost will therefore be less.

We are hoping next year to be able to quote a
lower figure, for the cost of food is coming down,
and experience has taught us how to economise
further in various ways which do not affect the
welfare of the children.

PART IV

CHAPTER XV

THE PAST AND THE FUTURE

For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,
Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonders that could be*

Locksley Hail.

HARD by the Rachel McMillan Nursery School
stands the handsome church of St. Nicholas.
Written in Latin on a monument of white marble
we may read an interesting inscription:

Richard, son of John Evelyn, rests under this stone,
and with him rests everything that a father's love can
cherish and lament when deprived of. The fair face no
longer as of old, bright with the smile of intelligence;
the unusual grace of manner which few can attain, which
all who knew him will miss, the simple talk in French or
Latin languages which he took in with his Mother's milk
all silent now: He had begun the study of the arts, and with
the principles of arts had learned those of piety as well;
and was so fond of his books that only death could tear
him from them. His example showed how much natural
quickness, discipline and labour, when united, could
achieve. Marvellous as a child, what would he have been
when old, had fate allowed him length of life? But God
decreed otherwise. A slight fever carried him off after he
had lived five years, eight months and a few days . . .
What mortals love, let them beware never to love too well.

Little Richard Evelyn died on 27th January, 1658.
His father, John Evelyn, in his famous diary,
writes of him at length. We are told that at the age
of eighteen months he could read perfectly any of
the English, Latin, French or Gothic letters, pro-
nouncing the first three languages exactly. Before

75

76 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

his fifth year he could "read most written hands,
decline aU nouns, conjugate the verbs regular, and
most of the irregular," and "could turn English
into Latin and vice versa, construe and prove what
he read. . . . The number of verses he could recite
was prodigious. Seeing a Plautus in his father's
hand, he asked what book it was, and being told
it was a comedy and too difficult for him, he wept
for sorrow/'

We are told that he gave grave advice to his
little brother John. He was "but a child/' and he
must be excused when he was impatient or naughty.
From the dizzy heights of his advanced years
Richard looked down with love and compassion
upon his little brother.

Poor little Richard Evelyn! It is interesting to
note what, in his father's judgment, was the cause
of his untoward death. "In my opinion," writes
John Evelyn, "he was suffocated by the women
and the maids that tended him and covered him
with too hot blankets as he lay in a cradle near an
excessive fire in a closed room." The unhygienic
conditions which prevailed at the time were the
cause of many premature deaths. Two of the
daughters of John Evelyn, beautiful and accom-
plished girls, died of the dread disease smallpox,
and of the eight children of whom his family
was composed only two survived him.

Thus we see that care and money could not save
the children of the well-to-do three hundred years
ago. What then must have been the condition of
the poor, when even the educated classes had so
little knowledge of hygiene?

Almost more deplorable was the condition of
the children of the working classes one hundred
and fifty years ago. Children of all ages were em-
ployed in our factories, apprenticed at the age of

THE PAST AND THE FUTURE 77

seven to a life of martyrdom. Robert Owen tells
how, in the year 1815, he visited the mills where little
ones of four and five were employed for twelve
hours daily. In one instance he quotes the employ-
ment of a baby of three. "The way in which these
infants are. first employed," he says, "is to pick up
the cotton waste from the floor to go under the
machines where bigger people cannot creep. The
smaller they are the more conveniently they can
go under the machines."

These little ones sometimes worked for fourteen
and fifteen hours daily. They entered the mill gates
at five and six o'clock at nights. They had no
regular meal times, but ate their food when and
where they could in the dust-laden atmosphere of
the mill. They were not allowed to sit down,
and so utterly weary were they in the mornings
that the punishment for late-comers had to be
made very severe.

It is interesting to note that one of the doctors
commissioned to report on the health of the children
who served in the mills, commented adversely on
the long hours, and spoke of "the natural appetency
of all young creatures to locomotive exercise and
open air." Surely this enlightened friend of children
would further the cause of Open-Air Nursery
Schools to-day!

It is a far cry from the time when our little ones
toiled in the mines and the mills, goaded by the
stick of the overseer, to the day of welfare centres,
children's clinics, free kindergartens and nursery
schools. Yet we are only on the threshold of the
new era. We have as yet hardly begun to touch
the fringe of the work, which will surely find its
culmination in the twentieth century

What do we want? Well, to begin with, we want
Open-Air Nurseries and Nursery Schools in all our

78 OPEN-AIR NURSERY SCHOOL

slum areas, and if the work is to be done thoroughly
we must co-operate with the parents; we want
Club Houses for the mothers, run in connection
with the Nursery Schools.

It is so easy to criticise our fellow-creatures! We
point the finger of scorn at the white-faced woman
who stands outside the public-house with her glass
of beer, rocking her baby in her arms, as she enjoys
a gossip with her friends. We laugh at the antics of
half a dozen giddy factory girls who are practising
the latest dances to tunes ground by the wheezy
old barrel-organ at the corner. We prefer to chat
over the harmless tea-cup to dance in the com-
parative privacy of the ball-room, but surely the
same instincts are at work in us and in them?

If we lament the fact that women haunt the
public-houses, we must provide some counter-attrac-
tion. The conditions are difficult to-day, when a
large majority of the fathers of the little ones who
attend our schools are out of work. Morning after
morning they seek employment, and heartsick
return to their haunts under the archway facing
the school. Many of the mothers can find work, and
so they do double duty. They scrub and clean, or
work in the factories aH day, and return home at
night to " do a bit of washing." There is no comfort
to be found in the miserable place they call home.
They want light and companionship. They want
to live and to forget.

We must open dubs for our mothers in connection
with our Nursery Schools* We shall want one or
two good-sized rooms, a piano, a sewing-machine
and books. The Club House must be open every
evening, and sometimes there must be games and
dancing for those young mothers who are little
more than girls.

We shall show the mothers how to cut out and

THE PAST AND THE FUTURE 79

make simple garments for their little ones. We shall
buy good hard-wearing material, sell it to them at
reasonable prices, and show them how to work the
machine. We shall give simple lessons in hygiene
and cookery, and talk to them about what we are
trying to do for their children. We shall make it
possible for them to get light refreshments at
reasonable prices. In time such a club might
become almost, if not quite, self-supporting.

And then? When we have our Nursery Schools
and clubs for mothers? Then we must have Open-
Air Boarding Schools Camp Schools not too far
from their poor homes, for the children of our
densely-crowded slum areas.

The children of the well-to-do have boarding
schools. Many a beautiful house is left half-empty
during the long school terms. There are boarding
schools enough and to spare for the upper and
middle classes but what of our little slum-dwellers ?

We should like to send our children at the age of
seven straight from the Nursery School to a Camp
School, where their education could be continued
under similar conditions, but without breaking any
links with the home. So we should hope to create
a new race which would wipe out the disgrace of
the slum from our midst

FINIS

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